Digimon Adventure: Revolution
by The Other Side of Darkness
Summary: AU Major. Four years ago, Tai, Matt, Sora, Izzy, Mimi, Joe, TK, Kari, and Lucy were called upon to be the Digidestined and save two worlds. Now, with a new threat the likes of which they never would have imagined, they are called back to fight the good fight again. Sequel to Digimon Adventure.
1. Chapter 1 Enter Nibimon

I do not own Digimon.

I welcome thee to **Digimon Adventure: **_**Revolution!**_

Why 'Revolution'? The answer comes two fold.

One, after rewatching 02, I think that 'Revolution' is a fair title, given what happens in both the human and digital worlds. It starts with the first challenge, the Digimon Emperor, whom they over throw, then against all the other evils in their path until the grand ending. (I'm being purposely vague to avoid spoilers for anyone who may not know how the series ends, however unlikely that may be.)

Two, I like the Matrix Trilogy. Yeah, the second movie sucked. A lot. And the third was only marginally better. But I still like the title they gave to the third installment. Thus, **Digimon Adventure: **_**Revolution!**_

Now, for a more serious, and world changing, note. In this version of 02, **Davis Motomiya does not exist! **I was never overly fond of his character, to the point that I downright hated him at one point. I think he's ill suited to replace Tai, as he was slated to do in the series, and, instead of turning this into an effort in futility of trying not to bash his bad qualities to the point of exhaustion, I've taken the far more simple route of removing him from the equation. This one fact greatly changes the story already, without adding in Lucy and Skymomon, and it is just the first change that is readily apparent. It also leads to the only real spoiler you're going to get from me.

Lucy will not be taking Davis' spot as leader of the team. I've already worked out how things are going to flow, and I found that another cannon character would make a much better leader than either Lucy or Davis.

Now, please enjoy.

P.S. I do not own The Matrix.

Chapter One: Enter Nibimon

In this world, there are some things that will always remain true. The good will oppose evil. Dawn will come. Children will hate school. Junk food will always taste better than vegetables.

And Life will go on.

It had been four years, four whole years, since nine kids and their digimon friends had saved the world from the threat of the evil Apocalymon and all of his minions. The entire world had watched as the children, between the ages of eight and thirteen, stepped up to save, not just one reality, but two. They had risked their lives, just on the hope they could win.

Then, a year later, when a virus infected an artificial Digi-egg, making the digimon inside it go berserk, they had stepped up to the plate again, doing what needed to be done, and they were the only ones that could do it. Once again, almost the entire world was privy to this battle. Everyone with access to a computer had seen it as the Digidestined did everything they could and more to make sure they stopped the menace.

But still, life went on. It seemed like no time at all before the rest of the world forgot that digimon even existed. The threat over with, most people simply went back to their lives as if nothing had ever happened, believing it to be little more than a weird dream.

Some, though, would always remember. They would remember the friends they had left behind in the Digital World, and how they would forever be better for knowing them. They would remember the bond they shared. They would remember the promise they made. The promise to see one another again, no matter how long it took.

So, they waited, moving on with their futures, but not forgetting their pasts.

+-9

"Run! It's the Digimon Emperor!" A gravelly voice yelled. Many other voices screamed in terror, trying to get away from the threat.

The threat itself did not appear to be all that intimidating at first. It was a human boy with wild blue hair. He wore a pair of sunglasses with golden frames, a split blue cape trimmed in gold, coming out of two golden shoulder guards, black shoes, black gloves, and a blue and white body suit that ended in metal cuffs over his wrists and ankles.

Behind the wickedly grinning human was a massive black tower and all around him were black rings, flying under some strange power.

"Go!" he commanded the rings, "Capture all of the digimon!" He laughed wickedly as they flew through the air, opening up and snapping into place around any digimon they came across.

Gotsumon, the rock digimon. Gazimon, the grey rabbit digimon. Even Unimon, the flying horse digimon. All of them were simply targets for the rings.

But one so far was proving more resistant to the Digimon Emperor's control. A single Gatomon.

The white cat digimon with purple tufts of fur coming off the tips of her ears and the end of her tail was running for her life, just like all of the others. Around her neck was a whistle and on her tail was a golden ring.

And most importantly, she was the digimon partner of one of the Digidestined from four years ago. Of the nine digimon that had been bonded to a human partner, only Gatomon had achieved a state that allowed her to remain in her Champion form indefinitely. It was this aspect that made her perfect for the mission of investigating this so called Digimon Emperor. Of them all, aside from one who was indisposed at the time, she had the best chances of success.

It was a good thing it had been her, too. The other digimon did not have the same agility that she possessed.

She dodged the rings left and right, jumping over one as it flew towards her. At the last second, before it could touch her, she smacked it with her brightly glowing tail ring, knocking it far off course.

Gatomon then rested against a tree, taking a breather. Whatever this strange human had done, it seemed to be draining her energy. Were it not for the tail ring, she'd be a goner already.

"I need you, Kari," she whispered the name of her human partner from so long ago. She took another deep breath and stood ready to run again, to warn the other digimon, when a noise came from the early dawn darkness off to her left.

In the shadows, a red strip of light glowed ominously and something growled from that position.

"Who's there?" the cat digimon demanded, looking into the shadows.

From the darkness came Unimon. Unimon had large grey wings, white fur and a red helmet over his equine head with a visor that was normally blue. The newest accessory he wore, a black ring with red glowing Digicode around his neck, that seemed the be having quite an effect on his attitude. He didn't even introduce himself before just opening his mouth and firing a blue and white sphere of energy at Gatomon.

"_Horn Blaster!_"

+-9

In the Human World, in the Odaiba district of Tokyo, Japan, to be specific, a woman's voice filled an apartment.

"TK, are you awake? It's almost time for school!"

"Yeah! I'm just finishing up breakfast!" the boy in question shouted back before mumbling to himself, "New apartment, new school, same old, lumpy oatmeal." TK Takaishi had grown since his first time in the Digiworld. Where once stood a runt, all elbows and knees, stood a young preteen who had finally hit his growth spurt. In honesty, the young man was taller than Tai and Matt had been when their journey first started. His blonde hair was a little wild, but he tamed it down well enough, and his crystal blue eyes were full of warmth. He was wearing a green shirt, with long yellow sleeves, green shorts and, on his belt, a silver device not of his world.

"I'm heading out, now," the boy called to his mother as he picked up his backpack and a white bucket hat that he dropped on his head, "See you later."

"I'm sorry I can't drive you to school on the first day," his mother said as he passed her office, "but I've really got to get this done. They're having me write a full report on the history of toilet paper," the woman who also had blonde hair did not sound very entheusiastic about her chore, but was typing away at her computer none the less.

"It's okay," TK told his mother, "I'll walk. It's not that far from here and I can see the old sights on the way."

"Okay, sweetie. Have a good day," the blonde woman told him, going back to her assignment.

As he walked to the door of his new home, another device in his pocket beeped musically and vibrated. Reaching in, he pulled out a hand held computer with a yellow glyph of Patamon on the back. He flipped it open to find he had an email.

_Hey, TK,_

_Good morning! Just thought I'd let you know, I'm in Class A. Meet you at lunch?_

_Your friend, Kari._

TK grinned as wide as ever, seeing this note from his best friend. He quickly typed out a response before hitting send. He slipped his shoes on by the door.

"Later, mom," he called out, before opening the door and heading to the elevator. He couldn't keep the grin off his face. Finally, after having been away for about three years, he'd finally get to see, not just Kari, but almost all of the old group again. They had used the D-terminals to keep in contact, for the most part, but there was a big difference between sending emails back and forth and standing right before your friends and talking to them. In particular, he couldn't wait to see his older brother, Matt. Last he heard, the older blonde was beginning his own band.

The only two he wouldn't be able to see by moving back to Odaiba were Mimi Tachikawa, who'd moved to America with her family, and Lucy Suzumebachi. The ninth member of their group, Lucy, had decided to stay in the Digiworld, four years ago. She also kept in contact through email, but, with being Gennai's apprentice, her responses were a little sporadic and she seemed to drop off the scene a few months ago.

Still, knowing that a major reunion was in his future, the boy couldn't have been happier unless the digimon were pulled back into the picture.

The elevator finally reached his floor, the doors opening and revealing two kids already riding within. The first was a girl who appeared to be a little older than him, with purple hair and large, circular glasses. The second was a young boy with dark hair and eyes, wearing a blue sweater and black pants.

"Hi," TK said with a smile, "I'm TK, I'm headed to Odaiba Junior High. Nice to meet you."

"Oh," the girl blinked at him for a moment before smiling, "I'm Yolei. Would you like to walk to school with us? It will take twelve point three minutes without wind," she said, then gestured to the younger boy to her right, "This is Cody, my neighbor."

"Welcome to the building, TK," the little boy said with a smile of his own, happy to meet a new potential friend, "Come on, we don't want to be late on our first day." The younger boy's voice was a little raspy, it kind of reminded TK of Lucy.

The blonde nodded, stepping into the elevator, "Sounds good to me."

The trip, just as promised, took not that long at all. TK was grinning like a loon the whole way to school. Some things had changed, especially the area round where the old TV station used to be. Myotismon, or rather _Venom_Myotismon, had stomped it flat when he had fought against the Digidestined so long ago, and the entire area had to be rebuilt. They had even remade the old station, almost exactly as it was before, even with the spherical viewing platform.

"Hey, Yolei, can you come over after school and fix my computer again?" Cody asked as they approached the gates to the combined Odaiba Elementary and Junior High School.

"Only if your mom makes those brownies I love," the girl responded with a grin.

"I'll send an email and ask her if she'll make a batch, right away," the little boy told her.

"It's a deal!" Yolei then replied. Cody's mom was a great cook.

TK was walking a little bit behind them, listening to their conversation with one ear, while reminiscing about the past again. He knew that Kari had become interested in photography over the years, but he wondered how she had grown. Honestly, none of the kids had really thought about sending each other photos with their D-terminals, what with most of them living around one another, so he wondered if the girl had grown tall, just like he had.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a bunch of kids playing soccer. It seemed, today, that everything was bringing back memories of the past and his old friends. For a split second, he even thought he saw Tai in amongst the kids, but the image faded when he turned to regard it fully.

TK just shook his head with a nostalgic grin, "Nah, Tai couldn't be here. He's in High School already," he turned to the two he had walked to school with, "Thanks for walking to school with me," he told them.

"No problem, it's always good to meet new people," Cody replied.

"Yeah, think nothing of it. And if you ever have any problems with your computer, just come to me. I'm president of the Computer Club this year," Yolei said next.

"Cool, I'll be sure to come to your door if my computer goes on the fritz, then," he turned to walk in the direction of his classroom then, waving good bye to them, "See you later."

+-9

As the warning bell rang, students began to file into their classes. Some cheerfully, waiting to see friends after their summer break, others dragging their feet and bemoaning their fate, as if they were walking to their doom. Kari Kamiya was part of the former group.

Today was looking promising already. The sun was shining, the birds were chirping and her best friend in the whole world had moved back to Odaiba, and was even attending her school, starting that very day.

Kari, like TK, had grown a lot, though not nearly as much as the blonde boy. Currently, her hair was short, her bangs held back by a pink hair clip, she was wearing a white tank top with a pink stripe, long, fingerless pink gloves that reached midway up her biceps and yellow shorts. She also had a digital camera hanging from her necklace in place of the whistle she'd given to Gatomon the last time she'd seen her.

A few minutes later, the teacher came into the room, just as the final bell sounded.

"Okay, class, take your seats," the teacher drawled, getting the children to quiet down and pay attention, "I know the semester has just started, but we've already got a new student. Young man, please introduce yourself."

Kari looked up and a delighted gasp escaped her throat.

"I'm TK Takaishi, twelve years old," the blonde boy said, bowing formally, "Nice to meet you all." He caught Kari's eye and winked at her.

"Yes, thank you for that, now take a seat next to..." the man trailed off, looking around the room, "the girl with the camera around her neck, please."

TK nodded and moved over to sit next to his friend, the grin on his face getting more brilliant with each step.

"TK," she greeted him with her own shining smile, "Together again, eh?"

"Yeah," he nodded with as he sat down in the desk to her left, "I would have told you, but I wanted it to be a surprise."

"It was a good one," the girl agreed.

"And our teacher," he dropped his voice to a whisper, "Doesn't he look like Ogremon?"

The girl almost choked on laughter at that point. If you squinted, you could see the resemblance. If they ever got back to the Digiworld, she'd have to ask the green digimon if he had any family on this side, maybe a cousin.

+-9

Things were not going quite so well in the Digital world. The Digimon Emperor continued his rain of terror. Now, he was sending the digimon he had capture with his rings after those he had not.

"Oomph!" Agumon grunted as he fell to the ground, exhausted, "Tai, help! Tai!" the poor yellow digimon cried as more dark rings flew by over head.

+-9

In the human world, Tai's Digivice began to beep excitedly.

"What in the...?" the teen said. He was much taller than he had been four years ago and wearing the uniform of the local High School, but those were basically his only changes. He pulled the Digivice off his belt. Across the screen, red Digicode flashed urgently. He couldn't understand it, but he had an inkling of what was going on. "Agumon's in trouble," he looked up from his lunch, "Hang on, buddy!"

He ran from the cafeteria to the computer room. He didn't know if this would work, but he had to at least try. He turned on the nearest computer. The screen took a few moments to boot up, but when it did, it seemed to be a digital Digivice. The screen on the Digivice glowed red for a moment before it came to life with an image of his digimon, falling in the forest and calling out for his help.

"I'm coming, Agumon!" he exclaimed, holding the sides of the screen, then he grimaced, "Just as soon as I figure out how..." Luckily for him, his Digivice began glowing and keening, almost like the times it caused Agumon to Digivolve. He pulled the device up to his eyes again, then shot a look at the computer. "Well, here goes nothing," he thrust his hand forward, holding the Digivice up to the image of Agumon.

From outside the computer classroom, all you could see was a momentary flash of light then nothing. Inside, no one would even find a trace of Tai as the computer had turned itself off behind him.

+-9

By the time lunch had rolled around, TK and Kari were ready for a break. Even on the first day, school could be tiring. Luckily, no one had assigned any homework so far.

"So, how do you like your new apartment?" Kari asked the boy as they switched into their outdoor shoes.

"It's pretty nice, but my mom has hardly seen it. She's been locked up in her office for almost three days straight!" the blonde mentioned.

"Wow, must be an important article she's writing," the brown haired girl said.

"Hmm," the boy looked at the ceiling, considering what his mother had told him about the report on the history of toilet paper, "I guess you can say that," he grinned a little mischievously, "But it might get really nasty at some points."

"Oh, my!" Kari held a hand before her mouth, looking a impressed.

+-9

In the forests of the Digiworld, Agumon was not the only one being forced to run for his life. Patamon, Biyomon and Tentomon weren't having that great a time of it either. Behind them, a much bigger insectoid digimon with sharp blades for arms crashed through the trees with an angry roar. Around his middle was another dark ring.

"Hurry!" Tentomon cried, "Don't let Snimon catch us! This preying mantis digimon can cut through anything with his Twin Sickles attack!"

Even as the red bug digimon spoke it, the big green one powered it up.

"_Twin Sickles!_" lashes of pulsing pink energy flew through the air from his blade arms, smashing into both Tentomon and Biyomon.

Patamon was luckily unscathed, using the opportunity to hide in a tree well out of the digimon's path.

"Oh no," the tan little digimon said, "Biyomon! Tentomon!" Then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw something. No, not something, some_one_.

It was Tai!

"Agumon," the sixteen year old called out as he ran towards his fallen digimon. He knelt before the yellow dinosaur, trying to help him to his feet.

"Tai, you're here!" Agumon said. If it weren't for the whole running and fighting for his life thing, he'd be jumping for joy.

+-9

In his lair, in a dark room with multiple holographic screens, the Digimon Emperor watched the reunion of Digidestined and digimon with a malicious smile.

"_You've got to Digivolve!_" Tai told his partner on screen, his Digivice beeping as he said. But nothing was happening. It just continued beeping, but the keening sound of evolution wouldn't start. "_Huh? What's wrong with this thing? Did I forget to change the batteries?_"

"_That's why I need your help, Tai,_" Agumon told him, "_I can't Digivolve!_"

"_Did you forget how? It's just like riding a bicycle,_" Tai said to his partner, a slight frown on his face as he ordered, "_Now, start pedaling and Digivolve!_"

The evil Emperor just laughed, "It's no use," he gloated, even though they couldn't hear him, "As long as I have the Black Digivice, there's no way they can Digivolve. Ha ha ha ha!"

+-9

"Tai!" Patamon cried out as he flew down to the boy and his digimon, "I can't believe you're back! Did the others come with you? Where's TK?"

"Patamon," the wild haired teen greeted, "No, I think everyone else is still back home."

Before the conversation could continue, Snimon flew over head, noticed them on the ground and began a wide turn to come back and attack.

"I think we should talk more about this somewhere else," Agumon insisted, "Run!"

And they did, quickly moving out of the way of one attack, and just kept running.

"Over here!" a voice called.

They paused in their run briefly to see Gatomon, pointing off to the side before running that way herself. She quickly led them to a cave in a rock side. The entrance was far too small for Snimon to fit into, but that was only a temporary measure against this threat.

"We're gonna need more help," Tai said as he pulled out his D-Terminal with the orange Agumon emblazoned on the back, "I better contact the others." He began typing away with his thumbs as fast as he could, just sending a simple message." In his haste, he didn't write down everyone's individual email addresses, instead sending it to the local schools, hoping Izzy was still tapped into the network so he could gather up everyone.

+-9

In Odaiba Junior High, just after classes had ended for the day, Yolei was doing a maintenance run on the computers, making sure the network and the hard drives were all up and running.

Imagine her surprise when an email appeared on screen.

"'Come to the Digital World right away. The digimon need our help'?" she read aloud, "It must be a link to an online game. Let's see who sent it," she pulled up the sender, "Tai Kamiya. Hey, there's a girl in the seventh grade with the same last name. This email is probably hers." She quickly hit print and moved to go deliver the message to the younger girl in question.

+-9

At that very moment, TK and Kari were getting ready to leave for the day. They had plans to meet all the members of their group that still lived there in the park and just reminisce. It would still feel a little sad, not having Mimi and Lucy there, but they could still email the girls, so it wouldn't be too bad.

"So, are you glad to be back?" Kari asked her friend.

"Oh, definitely," TK grinned, "You can't believe how much I missed you guys."

"Yeah," the girl agreed, "Email is nice, but actually being here, together, makes all the difference."

"You bet," he nodded, "So, have you heard Matt play in his band yet? He says they're coming together pretty well."

"Mmhm!" Kari affirmed, "He's even better at the guitar than he is the harmonica."

Just as they were about to leave, Yolei ran up behind them, "Hey!" she paused, panting for breath.

"Oh, hi, Yolei!" TK waved.

She ignored him for the moment, walking up to the girl that was about a head shorter than him, "You're Kari Kamiya, aren't you?"

"Yeah, that's right," she nodded, "Why do you ask?"

"Well," the purple haired girl unfolded the piece of paper in her hand, showing them the message, "Are you related to Tai? He sent this email."

Seeing the message, both TK and Kari gasped. Then a firm look overcame the brown haired girl's face.

"My brother needs us," she said simply. She looked over her shoulder at TK and he nodded to her. The two of them turned back to Yolei, "Please take us to the computer room."

"Uh, you got it," she blinked, wondering why everyone was so serious all of a sudden.

They ran back through the building, rushing as fast as they could to get there. They came to a set of stairs that led both up and down just in time to see another familiar face.

"Izzy!" Yolei said, recognizing the genius.

"Hey, Yolei, I'm glad I found you!" the older boy with deep red hair and the uniform of the local High School said, "I need to use the computer room right away!"

Yolei had a wide smile on her face and practically had stars in her eyes, "You mean the legendary former Computer Club president is actually looking for me? I'm honored!" she clasped her hands before her, leaning slightly forward.

"What's up, Izzy?" TK grinned at his old friend.

Then Kari stepped forward, unfolding the paper for the tech genius to see, "Tai sent us an urgent email!"

"Yeah, I know!" the older boy nodded, "I got one, too."

"Well, come on, it's just this way," Yolei pointed down a hallway.

Finally making it to the computer room, Izzy quickly took over, going to the computer that Yolei had left on and began typing away.

"I was just about to send Tai an answer when the battery ran out on my D-terminal," Izzy explained, "I knew I should have recharged it after I played Trigonometry Trivia on the internet, last night, but boy, talk about fun," he smiled, remembering, "I got him!" he said suddenly, hitting send on his email to Tai.

+-9

After what seemed like an eternity, Tai's D-Terminal beeped and buzzed in his pocket. He quickly pulled it out and flipped it open.

"It's from Izzy!" the wild haired teen explained, "He's got Kari and TK with him!"

"Tai!" Agumon called out from somewhere deeper in the cave, "Come here, quick!"

The teen looked up from his portable computer, seeing his digimon and Gatomon and Patamon had disappeared deeper into their hiding place.

+-9

"What's the Digital World?" Yolei asked with an inquisitive smile, "Is that a new amusement park? I bet they have some great rides."

TK and Kari looked to one another with sheepish grins. While it was no real secret that there was a Digital World, what with the events of four years ago, the world seemed happy enough to forget about it entirely.

"It's, uh," Izzy stumbled, trying to think of a way to explain it, "It's not quite..."

"Hey, I've got an idea," Yolei said suddenly, clasping her hands before her as she looked from Izzy to TK and Kari, "Let's all go to the Digital World!"

"Yolei," Cody's voice came from outside the class room, the little boy showing up, "Weren't you coming over?" he asked, "Remember? You were gonna fix my computer."

"Oh!" The girl smacked herself on the forehead, "Sorry, I forgot," she turned back to the two underclassmen, "I guess we'll all take a trip to the Digital World some other time. Later." She left then with the little boy.

After she left, Izzy was able to pull up a similar program as the one that had allowed Tai to travel to the Digiworld.

"If Tai's there, that must mean the gate to the Digital World is open," he explained, "Now, we just need to find out how to get through." The gate on the screen remained red, no matter how Izzy prodded it with his computer skills.

+-9

Tai had followed the sound of his digimon's voice to a chamber in the cave that was much wider than the rest of it. It was well lit, a circular hole in the ceiling allowing the sun to shine through, and in the center, on a raised mound, was a Digi-egg. It had flame patterns all over it, and a giant blade sticking out of the top like a horn. Most importantly, the egg had the symbol for the Crest of Courage, just under the horn.

"Look at that!" Agumon exclaimed, looking at the egg.

"That's weird," Tai spoke, "It's got the Crest of Courage on it. Is it an egg?"

"I never saw an egg with a spike in it," his digimon answered.

"It must have been rough on the chicken that laid that thing," Gatomon quipped.

Tai grinned for a moment then took a couple steps forward, bending down to inspect the Digi-egg, "Let's have a closer look at this thing," he grabbed it, careful to avoid the blade, and tried to lift it up. Try being the operative word. The moment he touched it, the egg shined with blinding orange light, forcing the teen to let go so he could cover his eyes.

Once the light had cleared away, three fire balls about the size of a child's fist lifted into the air.

"Whoa," Tai breathed, "They look like fireflies," suddenly, the fireballs streaked through the opening at the top of the chamber, "Fast ones!"

+-9

In the human world, Yolei and Cody were just reaching the stairs after leaving the computer room.

"You did promise," Cody said plaintively at the somewhat depressed girl.

"I know," she drawled. It really wasn't so bad, but she had so wanted to go to the Digital World. It just seemed familiar to her for some reason. Like she had heard of it before.

Back in the class room, Izzy, TK, and Kari all had their Digivices out, trying to get them to respond in one way or another, but it just wasn't happening.

"I don't get it," Izzy sighed as he sat back down in the chair, "I've tried everything I can think and, short of prying it open with a digital crowbar, I just can't get it to respond. I'm sorry, TK, Kari. Tai might have to fight this one on his own."

Kari sighed, "It's okay, Izzy, we'll just have to keep trying. Tai might be in trouble, not to mention the digimon. We know he wouldn't stop trying to get to us, so we can't do any less for him!"

Just as the girl finished speaking, the entire screen lit up with blue radiance.

"Whoa!" Izzy exclaimed, forced to duck as three beams of light shot out of the monitor. One was pink, the next was purple, the final one was red. The pink light streaked towards Kari, curving forward just before it would hit her and combining with her Digivice, obscuring it in the pink glow.

The other two lights streaked out of the room, curving out into the hallway where they sought out Yolei and Cody, smacking into their hands and startling the two of them.

In the classroom, when the light died down, Kari's Digivice was dramatically changed. It had went from a little silver device with a short antenna, three buttons and a screen to the size of a cell phone. It still had the screen and the short antenna, but it rested more easily in her hand now, was colored mostly white and had pink side paneling. The buttons had changed a little, too, with a directional pad below the screen and two buttons right next to it for some reason.

"What in the world?" TK asked, looking at the new Digivice, "What happened to it?"

"I don't know, do you think it evolved, like our digimon, maybe?" Kari suggested.

"Look!" Izzy said suddenly, cutting off that train of thought, "The gate is open!"

TK and Kari looked at one another and nodded, "Let's go!"

Kari held up her weird new Digivice first. A flash of bright white light filled the room and the girl was gone. TK held up his old fashioned model next, "I'm right behind you." Again, a flash of light and then the boy was gone.

Izzy stood up and held his own Digivice before him, "I can't wait to see Tentomon again," just as he was about to hold his up to the screen, Yolei came skidding back into the room.

"Whoa! What's going on in here?" she asked, Cody right behind her.

Her sudden appearance startled Izzy, causing the boy to nearly drop his Digivice as he hid it behind his back, "Uh, nothing!" the teen tech genius laughed nervously.

"But, Izzy, what was that light?" Yolei asked as she approached him.

The High School student looked away from her, unable to lie directly to her face as he tried to brush it all off, "Uh, the computer must need a new screen saver," he said, followed by more nervous laughter.

+-9

Two orbs of light suddenly appeared in the forest of the Digital world, almost shaped like an egg. The slowly dissolved, piece by square piece, until they were completely gone, leaving behind TK and Kari.

"Wow," TK said, looking around at the oddly colored wild life and the beautiful but weird sky, "It's almost exactly like I remember."

"Yeah," Kari said, a frown on her face as she looked around, "But this is no time to stroll down Memory Lane. We need to find my brother, and the digimon."

"Uh-huh!" the blonde nodded, "Without them, we wont be able to fight if we get in trouble."

Kari pulled out her new Digivice again, hoping it had the same tracking capabilities as before. Luckily it did, and there was the mark of another Digidestined nearby.

"This way," she told TK walking through the foliage.

Unseen by either of the twelve year olds was a black ring floating in the canopy about them.

+-9

In his lair, the Digimon Emperor observed the two newest people to come to the Digital World.

"It seems I have some visitors in my garden, and they weren't even on the guest list," he grinned maliciously, "Let's see just where these interlopers are going, then I can send a _friend_ to meet them there."

+-9

Kari's Digivice beeped regularly, showing that TK was right next to her and Tai was somewhere up ahead.

"I think we're getting close," she told the boy next to her.

They passed a soda machine as she spoke, TK only giving it a passing glance as he scanned the forest for any hint of their friends, or danger. So far, nothing had come out and attacked them, but the Digiworld could be a dangerous place for the unaware.

"I wonder where all the digimon are," TK asked, "I mean, we should have seen something by now, right? Even if it was a bad guy."

"I think I'll pass on the bad digimon, but I wouldn't mind seeing Gatomon again," Kari replied.

"TK!" The familiar, child like voice of Patamon broke over the two Digidestined. The tan colored digimon flew forward with all due haste and landed in his partners arms.

"Patamon!" the blonde boy exclaimed, "Boy, am I glad to see you!" he laughed happily.

"Hi, guys!" Tai said as he came out of the tree line with Gatomon and Agumon right behind him, "I'm glad you made it, but where's Izzy?"

Before they could answer, Gatomon moved around the teen and jumped into a hug with his sister.

"Kari!" the cat cried, latching onto her human friend.

"Gatomon!" the girl greeted her digimon, laughing with relief. Then she gasped, "Your tail ring!" she pulled the digimon back to look in her big blue eyes, "Tell me what happened."

"Come on," Tai said before Gatomon could get started, "We'll tell you all about it back in the cave."

Luckily, they had appeared not far from the entrance of the hiding spot and soon the small group stood in front of the blade bearing Digi-egg. Then Gatomon began her story.

"One day, this bossy human appeared and began making digimon into his slaves," the cat digimon explained, "He said, 'I am the Digimon Emperor!'" her voice deepened to make a passing imitation at his voice, "I heard we're all gonna have to punch a time clock, too. I was running away from one of his enslaved digimon when I lost my tail ring. I would have been crushed without it, but it came off in the scuffle."

"Another human?" TK asked, shocked, "You mean that someone else comes here besides us? There goes the neighborhood."

"Yeah, and he's got this strange, new Dark Digivice that makes us unable to Digivolve," Gatomon continued.

"Hmm?" the blonde boy looked at his best friend, finding her eyes on his.

"Did it look anything like this?" Kari asked, holding up her pink Digivice.

Gatomon gasped, "Yes, it's exactly like that, but it's all black and evil! How did you even get that? What happened to your old Digivice?"

"We're not sure," TK answered, "Three lights shot out of the computer in our world, just a little while ago. One of them collided with Kari's Digivice, turning it into that."

_So, that's what that light was!_ Tai thought, _It transforms our Digivices. But why didn't it change mine? Why Kari? And who else had their Digivice change?_

+-9

In the Human World, Izzy was under scrutiny for his rather pathetic lies. Yolei was leaning forward, causing him to lean back, with her eyes narrowed and her hands on her hips.

"Where did everyone disappear to, Izzy?" she demanded rather loudly.

"I-I told you already, Yolei, they went home," Izzy was almost quivering. Sure, he was older than the girl, but she could be intimidating when she wanted to be.

"I'm not letting you off the hook that easy!" She crossed her arms and stood up straight, "I know you're hiding something, Izzy! Now, _what_ is the Digital World? And what, exactly, are digimon?"

"Uh, I, I don't know what you're talking about!" he tried, hoping she would believe him. An effort in futility.

She just narrowed her eyes at him again, reaching into her pocket and pulling out a red Digivice, the same model as Kari's, "Then what do you call this?"

Izzy gasped in surprise, "Where did you get that?"

"Cody's got one, as well," she told him, "Start talking!"

Just outside the classroom, talking into a pay phone, Cody explained to his mom why he was late in getting home.

"No, Yolei's not coming over. We have to stay after school for computer club," he told her, "But since you made the brownies, I'll come home and pick them up, first." In his right hand was the blue paneled Digivice, just like Yolei's and Kari's aside from color.

+-9

"The Dark Digivice is draining our power and making us all weak as newborn kittens," Gatomon said, still staring at the one in Kari's hand, unable to comprehend how the two might be related. Hell, Kari was the holder of the Crest of _Light_, the polar opposite of Darkness! So how did this all make sense?

"So, that's why you couldn't Digivolve," Tai said, looking at Agumon.

"Yeah!" the yellow dino said, crossing his arms, "If I could Digivolve, he wouldn't stand a chance!"

Even as they spoke, the ring that had spotted TK and Kari had followed them into the cave, observing them, sending its signal back to base.

Gatomon went on with her explanation, no one noticing as the ring floated into the chamber, "The Digimon Emperor uses these Dark Rings to control the digimon."

"Yeah," Patamon nodded, "That's right. And once a ring captures you, you're his slave for life!"

"The collars do everything but get rid of fleas," Gatomon said with a drawl.

"Digimon Emperor," Kari almost spat out, a frown on her face, "I'm gonna slap a Dark Ring on him!"

+-9

In the dark room from which he was watching them, the Emperor just laughed at her declaration.

"Oh, you think so, do you? Well, this is just a game to me," he smirked at the close up of Kari's face, "And I'm afraid if you can't play by my rules, I'll just have to disqualify you," he lifted his hand into the air before him and a rectangle made of red holograms appeared before him, each of them holding a single character of Digicode, "Hm, now who will destroy you? Eeny, Meeny, Miny, 'Mon!" He tapped on on the right side of the rectangle causing a picture of a four legged dinosaur digimon to pop up, "Attack, Monochromon!"

Deep in his dungeon, lights traced along the floor until they reached the cell with the corresponding digimon, waking it up and causing its eyes to glow an eery red. It was lifted up to the surface, panels sliding back to allow him into the fresh air. The digimon roared angrily, moving off to follow his orders.

+-9

In the cave, Tai had pointed out the Digi-egg to them.

"Looks like a deflated beach ball," TK commented, "No wonder, it's got a spike through it."

"Yeah, and it's heavier than my mom's meat loaf," Tai said, "I couldn't make it budge an inch."

"Hm, let me try," the blonde boy said. He took a few steps forward and gripped the egg. He pulled up with as much strength as he could must, but it didn't even twitch. "It wont come loose."

"Move aside," Kari said, coming up from behind him, "This is a woman's job." The girl rubbed her hands together then wrapped them around the egg, careful to avoid the blade spike. She took a breath and lifted.

The girl was almost thrown off her feet. She had expect some resistance. If the struggle TK had put up was any indication, it must weigh a ton. But just not to her.

"Wow! It's actually pretty light," the girl marveled.

"Whoa," TK said, "How did you do that?"

"It just came right up, no problem at all," Kari replied, holding the egg in one hand, "Here," she held it out to her brother.

"Huh!" he took the egg from her. It really only weighed about as much as a large orange, "I wonder what it means that you could pick it up and we couldn't."

"I don't know," the brown haired girl shrugged again, taking the egg back, "But I've got another question for you. What do I do with it?"

Before that question could be answered, the ground began to shake violently, debris falling from the ceiling.

"Why don't I think this is the cavalry?" Tai yelled over the sound of breaking rock.

"Look!" TK pointed up. The others looked, just in time to see the ceiling beginning to crack before a white digimon with black armor plates burst through the rock with a roar in its throat, "Monochromon!" the blonde remembered this digimon from his first day in the Digiworld four years ago, though this one had a large Dark Ring around his middle, "His shell is harder than diamonds! His attack, Volcanic Strike, sends out millions of fireballs!"

Patamon immediately moved to protect his partner as the dinosaur digimon moved into the chamber, "_Boom Bubble!_" The ball of condensed air slammed into the digimon harmlessly.

"_Pepper Breath!_" Agumon tried next. It was equally useless, only getting the enslaved digimon to roar again.

It opened up its mouth, showing rows of sharp teeth, "_Volcanic Strike!_" Fire gathered in the back of his throat.

"Run for it!" TK shouted, leading the way, closely followed by Tai, Kari and their digimon.

The attack hit the entrance just behind them before dissipating, but the digimon didn't stop there. The could hear, and feel, it stomping along behind them, crashing through the areas that were too narrow for it with no difficulty what so ever.

"He's been eating his vitamins!" Tai quipped even as he ran for the exit.

"There's the exit!" Kari pointed ahead, over taking the boys and getting out ahead of them, Gatomon right next to her, "Fresh air, open space, plenty of directions to dodge," she turned around to see TK and Tai just as they were pulling out of the cave, "Over here!"

The boys took a step in her direction, meaning to get over to her. But it was not to be. Monochromon exploded out of the rock just twenty feet to their right, a debris washing over the area in a storm.

The dinosaur digimon didn't give them any chance to recover, turning to them with his mouth open, fire gathering in his throat, "_Volcanic Strike!_"

"No! Tai! TK!" Kari cried out, watching as her brother and best friend were about to be fried to a crisp. There was nothing she could do. She wouldn't be fast enough. And Gatomon couldn't Digivolve to Angewomon. Tears gathered in her eyes as she realized she was about to lose two of the most important people in her life.

Just as she was about to try futilely running forward, the egg in her hand and the mutated Digivice on her hip both began to glow brightly with the light of fire. Then words appeared in her mind.

"What's happening, Kari?" Gatomon said, "I can feel energy flowing through me, what's going on?"

"I... I don't..." she frowned then with determination in her eyes as she held up the egg, "Digi-Armor, Energize!"

The bladed Digi-egg dissolved into a stream of fire that swirled through the air, rushing towards Gatomon. Instead of consuming the cat, the flames began to cloak her, change her. They seeped into her every pour, made her every strand of fur glow with the orange power they were unleashing upon her.

"Gatomon, Armor Digivolve to..." phantom images of Agumon, Greymon, Metalgreymon, and even Wargreymon appeared in the flames before they dispersed, revealing what Gatomon had become, "Nibimon!"

Like most Digivolutions, this one caused Gatomon to grow into a much larger shape, standing just a foot taller than the average human adult. Her fur retained its usual white hue, with a mane of fire going down the back of her neck. She stood on her hind legs, her eyes glowed with the light of fire and smoke and embers blew out of her nostrils when she exhaled heavily. Her upper body was covered from her neck down in a metal chest plate with feminine definition. The actual 'breasts' of the chest plate were painted with a fire pattern, and on her sides, over her ribs and hips, were glowing red stripes that trailed steam behind her. On her shoulders were shoulder guards covered in gold and red fur that almost appeared to be fire themselves. Coming out of each arm hole in the chest plate was a long kimono sleeve, blue with orange fire patterns flicking upwards from the bottom seam of each sleeve, her four fingered hands, each digit ending in a wicked claw, sticking out from the cloth. A charcoal black belt held up a pair of parachute pants with the same pattern as the sleeves. Finally, coming from the base of her spine, was not one, but two, long tails, each one lashing about separate from the other and ending in blue fire.

The new evolution of Gatomon didn't waste a second, jumping forward with a lion like roar.

"_Twin Tail Inferno!_" Her voice was deep but feminine. The attack started at the ends of her tails, the flames turning into huge fireballs. The tails lashed forward, touching her hands, wreathing them in the flames. Then the evolved cat digimon jumped forward, meeting the fireballs from Monochromon, head on.

"What the...? Nibimon?" Tai asked, seeing his sister's digimon Digivolve, "Armor Digivolve?"

"That's Nibimon!" Agumon exclaimed, "She's a legendary fire cat digimon with two tails! Her Twin Tail Inferno can burn even other flames and her Warrior's Fire is nothing to shake a stick at, either!"

Having negated the attack with her own fire, Nibimon shot forward at the Monochromon, landing on his snout then jumping into the air. While above the dinosaur digimon, she reached into her left sleeve and pulled out a black claymore, blanketed in in blue flames, "_Warrior's Fire!_" The fire cat digimon lashed the sword at Monochromon, specifically at his Dark Ring, the blade slicing through the evil device like butter, yet not even nicking the enslaved digimon.

The ring cracked outwards from the cut then shattered into millions of bits of corrupted data.

"Oh, wow!" TK breathed, watching the whole battle take place in about ten seconds, total.

Before he could do anything else, TK and Tai were bowled over by a girl that was nearing hysterics.

"Tai, TK!" she cried, hugging them both to her, "I'm so glad you're okay!"

"Ugh! That's, un, great, Kari," Tai grunted, "But you're, guh, squeezing too hard!"

"Huh?" the girl opened her eyes, seeing her brother and her best friend struggling for breath, "Oh, I'm sorry!"

Even as she spoke, Nibimon came over, glowing yellow for a moment before the energy drained back into Kari's new Digivice.

+-9

The Emperor frowned at the battle he had just witnessed. Then he began to grin.

"Armor Digivolve, huh?" his smirk grew wider, "Against the power of my Dark Digivice, they shouldn't be able to Digivolve at all. Hm... They're more resourceful than I thought," he began to laugh to himself, still assured of his complete dominion over the Digital World, no matter what these interlopers tried.

+-9

"Take care, Monochromon!" Kari yelled to the retreating dinosaur digimon, "Try not to get caught again, okay?"

Monochromon seemed to nod, but otherwise just continued on his way, keeping an eye open to make sure he didn't get blindsided by another Dark Ring.

With that done, they needed to find a safe place, or alternatively, a way back home, before something else came after them.

"Wow, Kari!" TK gushed, walking next to his friend as they made their way through the forest, "That was awesome!"

"Thanks, TK," the girl smiled, "But I couldn't have done it without Gatomon."

"Nope!" the cat disagreed, "I would have been worse than useless if your Courage hadn't opened the Digi-egg, Kari."

"Yeah!" Tai said, "That's my sister," he spoke proudly, "But something's missing." Looking back at him, the teen had a slight frown on his face and a hand on his chin in thought, "Aha!" He grinned as he pulled his goggles off his head and slid them over his sister's.

"Huh?" She intoned, "What are you doing?"

"None of us can get our digimon to Digivolve anymore, Kari, only you can," Tai said seriously, "That means you have to take charge of the team," then he grinned, "And the leader needs an awesome pair of goggles, right?"

Kari blinked at her older brother for a couple moments, then smiled brightly. She touched the goggles sitting on her forehead, feeling the weight of their symbolism, then hugged her brother.

"Thanks, Tai! I promise, I'll make you proud," she said.

"I know you will. Now, let's get somewhere safe before it gets dark," the teen said.

"Yeah," TK piped in, "Who knows what the Digimon Emperor will send after us once the sun is down?"

"Actually," Gatomon broke in, "The Digimon Emperor never comes out at night, it's the only time we're safe from that maniac."

"Huh," the blonde boy hummed, "I wonder why that is?"

"Look!" Kari said, pointing forward at a TV in the Middle of a field. On the screen Izzy, Yolei and Cody were enjoying a batch of brownies, fresh baked.

"_Wow! You were right, Yolei! These brownies are great!_" Izzy said, taking a bite.

"_I know, right?_" the girl said with a blissful smile on her face.

"_They're my mom's special recipe,_" Cody explained, proud of the praise his mother's cooking was getting.

Tai looked at the TV with his head tilted to one side, "Hey, I wonder if we can use this to get home."

"I don't know," TK shrugged, "I mean, it seemed simple enough to get here, but we had to take the cable car back last time."

"Well, we'll never know if we don't try, right?" Kari said, reaching for her new Digivice.

"Wow, you guys are slick."

The group whirled around, facing the forest that the feminine voice had come from. It was a little raspy, almost like the persons throat was sore, and it was very clearly feminine.

"Who's there?" Kari called out, stepping into her role as leader of the group, "Show yourself!"

"Oh?" the voice came again, clearly amused, "It's not every day you get to see Kari Kamiya's resolve face. Must be a special occasion."

The kids gasped.

"How do you know her name?" TK yelled into the forest.

"That's not all I know," the owner of the voice stepped out from behind a tree, "I know that you are TK Takaishi and he's Tai Kamiya, Kari's older brother," the person was human, wearing a black hoodie with short sleeves and a pink stripe going up the arms. She had beige colored baggy pants that went down to just below her knees before they were taped down by white bandages. On her feet were a pair of red Converse. Her forearms were covered by blue bracers, her hands resting in the big pocket of her hoodie. Her face was covered by the shadows projected by her hood. All they were able to see was her grinning mouth. "And I know," she said, grabbing the sides of her hood, "that none of you are leaving here..."

Tai, TK and Kari tensed, getting ready for a fight. If this was the Digimon Emperor they had to take her down quick, before she called in more of her slaves.

She pulled the hood down, showing off long pink hair with light pink highlights tied back in a ponytail, only a few strands resting on the sides of her face, and bright green eyes glittering mischievously, "Without giving me a hug."

The small group blinked. Had she just asked for a _hug?_ What kind of evil wannabe emperor would ask for a hug, of all things? Then Tai's eyes widened.

"Lucy?" he breathed, "Lucy!" He was the first to rush forward, sweeping the somewhat shorter girl up in the requested hug. The girl laughed at his exuberance, her feet not even touching the ground anymore, hugging him back.

"Hey there, Goggle Brain," she said, pulling back, "Good to see you, too."

TK and Kari made it to them then, making it a group hug, only getting more happy laughter from the fourteen year old that spread to the others. It was nice to feel so appreciated.

Meanwhile, Skymomon dropped out of the trees to reunite with the digimon.

"Hey, Skymomon, where have you two been for the last three months?" Gatomon asked the flying blue monkey.

"Ogremon and Leomon were getting into it again," the digimon explained, brushing back some of her green braids, "So, we had to go all the way to File Island and mediate. Round One lasted an entire week!"

"Wow, that's kind of rough," the cat digimon said.

"So, who won?" Patamon asked.

"Neither one of them," Skymomon shrugged, "After two rounds that lasted a week each, they knocked each other out in the third. We would have been back sooner, but Whamon had to take a detour."

"Wow!" Tai said, once they had all pulled out of the hug, "Look at you, Lucy, you look great!"

The teen girl smiled, only a slight dusting of pink on her cheeks, "Thanks, you're not looking too bad yourself, Tai," she then turned to TK and Kari, "And you two, who would have ever guessed that the runt of the group would end up being so tall? Or that Kari Kamiya, Queen of the Digimon, would turn out to be a warrior princess?"

"Hey, I wasn't that short!" the blonde boy said with mock indignity.

"Ha! Say's the boy who was shorter than Kari by no less than three inches," Lucy teased.

The blonde stepped up beside the brown haired girl in question, "Yeah, well not anymore, huh?" The boy had, at least, five inches on Tai's little sister now.

"We missed you," Kari said after a couple seconds, then her mouth formed an 'o', "Hey, Lucy, do you know anything about the Digimon Emperor? Or these new Digivices?" Kari held her's up for the Guardian's perusal.

"Well, I dunno anything about your Digivice, but that Digimon Emperor guy?" The pink haired girl frowned, "Yeah, I know a little. Jerk showed up a few weeks back, just as I was leaving File Island. The digimon have told me that the ego maniac declared himself king of our world. He's got some Dark Rings he controls the Digimon with and," she glared off into the distance, "He's got these huge, black towers spread out all over the place. I dunno what they're for, but I doubt it's to grow flowers."

"Hey, now that you mention it," Gatomon said, holding a paw to her chin, "I remember seeing something like that this morning when he showed up with all those Dark Rings."

Tai clenched his fists at his side, "This guy sounds like he's gonna be a real problem."

"Okay, now one last question," Kari said, "Do you know how to get back to the Human World? We were thinking about trying to use our Digivices on the TV, but would that really even work?"

"Yeah, it should," the pink haired girl said, "I remember Gennai saying something about it. Something about Izzy figuring it out the last time we were here. He's been working on that ever since everyone had to leave last time. He wouldn't tell me exactly what, but I guess this is it," she stepped forward making sure not to get to close, "Only question I've got is why he just dumped them all over the place like this. I must have run into dozens of these, all across the continent, and another couple of 'em back on File Island."

Tai, TK and Kari looked at one another, then the teen with wild hair spoke, "Did any of the other TVs have any big caves or something nearby? Anything worth noting?"

Lucy looked skyward, tapping her chin for a moment, "Now that you mention it, a few of them were near some landmarks, but the rest were just scattered around. Why?" she looked at Tai then the two preteens, "Something going on? Aside from his holy jerk-itude?"

Kari pointed back the way they came from, "There's a cave about a mile behind us. Tai used it as a hiding spot to contact us at first, but then he found this Digi-egg with the Crest of Courage on it."

"Yeah," the teen nodded, "When I tried to pick it up, it wouldn't move, but these three lights came out of it. One of them changed Kari's Digivice into that. And when they came through the portal, only Kari could pick up the egg."

"And that's not all," TK said with a grin, "Kari used the egg to get Gatomon to Armor Digivolve into Nibimon. It was so cool!"

"Holy- No way!" Lucy said, her eye wide, "Gennai told stories about Armor Digivolving, but I thought he was just going off on tangents, you know? Old guy hasn't gotten any more straight forward than he was the last time you all saw him, I swear," the last part was grumbled out, getting the kids to chuckle a little.

Then Tai got serious, "Listen, Lucy, it's been a while since most of the gang has been together, so we were gonna hang out in the park, catch up. With what's happening in the Digiworld now, I think we're gonna have to tell everyone what's going on. Will you come with us?"

"Yeah!" Kari said with a grin, "That's a great idea! You can spend the night at our place and you can come back home tomorrow! Besides, I'm sure that Sora and the others would love to see you again."

Lucy crossed her arms for a moment, tilting her head to one side, then shrugged with a smile, "Sure, I think it'll be good to see everyone again."

"Alright!" Tai cheered, "So, how do we use this to get back to our world?" he gestured at the TV.

"Simple, you just hold your Digivice up to it, and it will do all the rest," Lucy grabbed hers off her waist and held it up to the screen of the TV. Her form was ensconced in light for a few moments before she was gone. The last thing they heard before she was in transit was, "I'll be back tomorrow, Skymomon, see you soon."

"Sounds simple enough to me," the wild haired teen said as he repeated her actions, "I'll try to bring everyone I can tomorrow," he told the digimon before the light enveloped him.

Kari knelt before Gatomon, TK standing behind her with Patamon, "You take care of yourself, okay? We'll be back as soon as we can, then we'll stop the Digimon Emperor."

"Yeah, weird towers, Dark Rings, Dark Digivice, doesn't matter," TK said, "We'll get the job done."

"Right!" their digimon said at the same time.

The two turned to the TV, holding up their Digivices and letting the light take them.

+-9

In the Human World, Izzy was taking a breather from the chocolatey goodness, "These are completely delicious." Finding out Yolei was apparently a Digidestined allowed the boy to explain about what had really happened, and by the time he was done with that Cody came back with the brownies. So, now, all they had to do was wait for the others to get back, then he could find out what happened in the Digiworld.

His eyes closed, he missed it when the gate opened again, but Yolei didn't.

"Hey, Izzy, that thing is blinking," she told the older boy.

"Huh?" He looked over at the computer, just in time to see a bright flash of light and get a tangle of kids dropped on him.

Lucy proved she hadn't only grown taller, but more agile as well, managing to catch herself on the computer table as she appeared and flipped out of the way of the others, allowing her to laugh at the tangle of Digidestined on the ground before her.

"Wow!" she gasped out through her giggles, "This brings back memories."

"Aw, man!" Tai groaned as he lay there in the middle of the heap, TK and Kari above, Izzy, Cody and Yolei below, Lucy watching, "This is not how I imagined this going."

"Get off!" Izzy grunted, "You're crushing my brownies!"

Chapter One: End.

Please Enjoy.


	2. Chapter 2 Digiteam Completed

Chapter Two: The Digiteam Complete

When Lucy decided to stay behind in the Digital World, four years ago, she did so knowing that she would probably never get to go to school again. She'd never join a sports team. Never become the valedictorian. Never have to sweat over any end of the year exams.

That's not to say she stopped learning. Gennai, along with teaching her the duties of being a Digiworld Guardian, insisted that she receive a general education as well. It was incredibly boring at times, but he assured her that she would thank him later in life.

On her own, though, Lucy refused to fall out of shape. At first, she just jogged around the lake in which Gennai hid his home, then swam a couple laps from side to side. Then, as Gennai began to send her out to settle disputes between digimon, she found that being quick on her feet was a handy asset for getting her rear out of the line of fire when negotiations broke down. So, she built on that. She asked her mentor if there was somewhere she could train her reflexes and agility, but it was Skymomon who answered.

"You can just swing through the trees with me, Lucy!" the digimon said, a big grin on her adorable little face.

Gennai thought the idea had merit, and told Lucy as much, encouraging the action.

So, she did. She didn't quite swing through the branches like the monkey digimon, but she did learn how to flip and jump through the underbrush and the branches above like a gymnast in training.

In the girl's own words, the exorcizes were 'worse than playing dodge ball against a team consisting of Etemon, Devimon, Myotismon, and Piedmon, with Apocalymon as the ref.' The first few months, the girl showed up with more bruises, cuts and scrapes on her body than her entire time in the Digiworld to date.

But she stuck to it. By her third year in the Digital World, Lucy could almost soar through the trees, quiet as a wing beat, and had the reflexes to dodge just about anything. And she never quit doing it, either.

So, by the time that she reappeared in the human world, the first time in a little more than four whole years, it was no surprise that the girl was able to dodge the bullet that was the mixed up pile of kids and brownies the others had become.

Lucy's giggles set the back drop as the kids began to untangle themselves.

"Where are we?" Tai asked, not quite able to look around at the moment.

"This is the computer room," TK told him, using the table behind him to lift himself up before offering a hand to Kari, who had rolled off him.

"Hey," Cody said, having wiggled out of the tangle the easiest, "when you guys came out of the computer, where did you come from?"

"Yeah," Yolei added, "And who's the ninja?" she cut her eyes to the still giggling Lucy.

Kari got to her feet then, a smile on her face, and gestured to her pink haired friend, "This is Lucy. She's a member of the old group. We just got back from her home. The Digital World."

Tai and Izzy finally stood up as well, the tech genius turning to their friend, "It's good to see you, Lucy. We've all missed you around here. Last I heard. Mimi went and dyed her hair pink, in honor of you."

"Nice to see you, too, Izzy," the fourteen year old girl grinned.

"It's nice to meet you," Cody said, turning to the pink haired teen, "I'm Cody, this is Yolei."

"A pleasure," Lucy curtsied.

"Yeah, this is nice and all, but can _we_ go to the Digital World now?" Yolei asked, gesturing to herself and Cody. Izzy had told them that they shouldn't, earlier, because the gate might close on them. But if Tai, Kari, TK, and some girl she'd never seen before could figure out a way to get back, then surely she could, too.

"I think we've had enough excitement for one day," the little boy disagreed.

The purple haired girl whipped her head in his direction, "Don't you want to go to the Digital World, Cody?"

"Of course," the boy nodded, "Seeing all those monsters and stuff would be fun, but tonight's macaroni and cheese night at my house, and I don't want to miss out."

"That's right," Tai said weakly, causing Yolei to switch her gaze to him, now, "It's Pork Surprise at my place." He sounded as though he would rather play catch with a Numemon.

"Stuffed green peppers and a salad," Izzy said.

"TV dinners in the microwave," TK sighed, also not feeling very good about his prospective meal.

Yolei looked to each of them, her expression dropping despondently.

"No fair!" the girl cried, "I wanna go!"

"Don't worry, Yolei," TK said as they all began to leave, "You'll get your chance, I'm sure."

"But when?" the purple haired girl whined.

"So," Lucy said,turning to Kari, "What's Pork Surprise?"

Kari grimaced, but put on a sheepish smile as she said, "I think you'll be happier not knowing."

"That good, huh?"

"You have no idea," Tai drawled.

"Oops!" Izzy commented, running back into the computer room, "I almost forgot to turn off the computer," he looked at the screen, noticing that the gate had closed again, "That's odd. I wonder why it closed again." He shook his head for the moment, turning off the computer. He'd have to figure it out some other time.

+-9

Just outside of the apartment block where Tai and Kari lived, Lucy stopped, looking up at the building. In the last four years, the Kamiya family had not moved. They still lived in the same apartment building that they had since they first moved from Highton View Terrace.

Lucy was staring at the building, particularly the fifth floor, fourth apartment from the left. The apartment she _used_ to live in.

"What are you thinking about, Lucy?" Tai asked, looking back at the girl.

"Just... I haven't seen mom or dad for four years, you know?" she smiled a little sadly to her friends, "It would have been nice to visit them. Just for the night," she shook her head, "I would do that, but they moved about a year ago."

Kari placed a hand on the older girl's shoulder, "You still might be able to visit, some other time, right? Now that the gate to your world is open, maybe you can come back again and look them up."

"Yeah," Tai said next, his hands behind his head, "We'll make a day of it."

Lucy smiled, less sadly and more genuine happiness, "Thanks, you guys. You're the best. Now, let's get to your place. Wouldn't want to be late, right?"

Tai almost turned green, "Yeah. Trust me, you _do not_ want to eat _cold_ Pork Surprise."

It didn't take the three of them very long to get to the thirteenth floor, Tai and Kari just moving right in and kicking off their shoes immediately. Lucy came in behind them, carefully storing her shoes.

"Mom, Dad, we're home!" Tai announced, "And we brought a friend."

"Oh, welcome back," Mister Kamiya said, looking over his shoulder at the group of three, "Nice to meet you, miss, uh..."

"Lucy," the pink haired girl bowed gracefully, "Its nice to meet you, too."

"Mom," Kari said, moving into the small kitchen with her mother, "Would it be alright if Lucy stays the night, please?"

Missus Kamiya looked to her daughter then to the pink haired girl who was just settling in on the chair to the side of their sofa, "Lucy? Hmm... Isn't that the name of the girl who used to live nearby? Didn't she..." their mother paused, remembering the last time she had seen the pink haired girl, as the kids were being lifted towards that rip in the sky by a rainbow light, "Didn't she move a few years ago?"

"Yes, but she came back to Odaiba, just for tonight," the twelve year old said, "It wont be any trouble, will it?"

Missus Kamiya just smiled and shook her head, "No, not at all. Of course she can stay the night," then she called out to her son, "Tai, why don't you be a dear and spread out the spare futon in your room for Lucy?"

"I got it," the teen said, coming out of the room he shared with his little sister, sans his school jacket. He moved over to a spare closet while Kari moved to sit on the couch next to their dad, already laughing at the comedy program being shown on the TV.

"So, Lucy," their mother began, "do you like pork?" Even as the woman spoke she added a whole ham to a boiling pot.

+-9

About an hour later, after the sun had set, Lucy, Tai and Kari were heading to the park where they were supposed to meet the others. Lucy in particular looked a little green around the gills and she was hunched over, holding her stomach as she walked. Tai was rubbing her back soothingly.

"Ugh, it tasted fine at first, but then... Urk!" the teen girl groaned a little, "Remind me to eat _before_ I come over next time. How can you two even stand it?"

"We've built up a tolerance over the years," Tai said honestly, "Pork Surprise isn't even the worst of it, trust you me."

"Looks like we're not the first ones here," Kari announced, looking forward.

Sitting on a bench, just to the side of the jungle gym, was a familiar seventeen year old boy with shoulder length blue hair. He had a blue jacket on, thick glasses on his face, and a duffel bag by his feet.

The teen looked over his shoulder and waved, "Hey, Tai, Kari," he blinked when he noticed the third person with them, "Who've you got there...? Is that?" the blue haired teen stood to his feet with a surprised smile, quickly moving up to the pink haired teen and enveloping her in a surprisingly strong hug, "Lucy! When, no, how, no, why-"

"Great to see you, too, Joe," the girl chuckled, squeezing him back.

Joe let the girl go, "Have you messaged Sora? She'll be ecstatic!"

"Nah, we want it to be a surprise for everyone," Lucy told him with a weak smile, her nausea finally fading.

"What's a surprise?" came the slightly aged, but still recognizable voice of the teenage girl in question. Lucy peaked around Joe to see TK, Izzy and Sora standing there. The common theme so far among the Digidestined was 'taller.' None had grown so much as TK had, but everyone was looking at the world from a higher vantage point than they had years ago. Joe had held his seat as the tallest of the group, though that was no surprise. Sora stood just a little taller than Lucy, who came up to Tai's shoulders. She wore the green shirt and skirt uniform of Tai and Izzy's high school, and apparently she'd left her hat somewhere, but it was still easy to point her out as Sora in a crowd.

When she laid eyes on the pink haired teen, she blinked for a moment, then smiled widely, "Lucy, you're back!" She kept up the theme of bum rushing Lucy with a hug, pulling her into a tight embrace.

"Hey, Sora," Lucy said, hugging the older girl she had once named as a surrogate sister, "You've grown up."

"And just look at you," the older girl gushed pulling out of the hug, "You've been doing pretty well yourself, huh?"

"Well," the pink haired girl shrugged with a grin, "I've been keeping fit."

"I've been meaning to ask about that," Izzy piped up then, "The way you moved, the swiftness of action, almost the very second you appeared from the gate. Yolei's designation of ninja was not far off the mark. How did you do it?"

Lucy smiled, placing her hands in the pocket of her hoodie, "I've been taking lessons from Skymomon. It's a lot easier to skedaddle out of the line of fire when you can use the trees like your personal highway."

"That brings up another point," the tech genius said, "Your duties as a Guardian, could you tell me about them? I would very much appreciate it."

"Sure," Lucy nodded, "Not much to it really. Heck, I'll see if I can't get a handbook made up for you."

"So," Kari cut in then, "What ave you been doing all these years?"

Seeing as they were still missing TK's older brother, the pink haired girl smiled and began her story, "It seems we've got a few minutes, I guess I can give you the cliff notes version," she smiled and picked a spot to sit, the others moving to comfortable positions of their own, "Gennai started off with the easy stuff. Mostly paperwork, but after a few months, he started sending me out on errands, even the occasional mediation..." the narration wasn't riveting, per say, but as the teen Guardian began to go into some of her more exciting, or funny, stories, the small audience was completely enamored. It lasted for a good twenty minutes before Matt arrived on the scene.

"Here he comes!" TK announced, standing to meet his older brother.

"Well, look at who's fashionably late," Lucy said with a grin, she was sitting on the jungle gym. Before he had showed up, she had been recounting some of the things she'd been up to in her home reality, basically just catching up with her friends.

"Lucy?" Matt asked, surprised to see her, "When did you get back to this side of the gate?" He moved forward to hug the girl, just like the others had done. He wore the same school uniform as Tai, Izzy and Sora and his blonde hair came down past his jaw, and he was equal in height with Tai. Over his shoulder was a guitar case, an electric guitar resting inside it.

"Just this afternoon," the pink haired girl said, pulling out of the hug.

Sora hopped down off the monkey bars, a smile on her face, "Can you believe we're all here, together again? Even Lucy. It's just too bad that Mimi couldn't make it. It's been too long since we've all been gathered together like this."

"Yeah, tell me about it," the older blonde said.

+-9

A couple floors above the floor of the building in which TK lived, Cody stood out on his balcony, a bokken in hand, wearing the traditional haori and hakama for practicing Kendo. He held the practice sword before him with both hands, his stance leading with his right foot.

"I wonder what it's really like to travel into the Digital World," the boy said to the balmy night air.

Just inside his room, Yolei had taken apart his computer and was fiddling with the bits inside of it to see what was wrong. She was no Izzy, but she knew what she was doing. It was just a matter of finding the problem and fixing it.

The purple haired girl frowned to herself as she started mumbling, "I don't care if they don't want me along. Tomorrow, I'm going to the Digital World!"

"Yolei, are you staying for dinner?" Cody's mother asked through the door, "Mac and cheese."

"No, but thanks anyway," the girl smiled appreciatively, "I have to get going." She quickly reassembled the computer, placing it back under the desk and plugging it back in, "That should do it, Cody. See you tomorrow."

"Thanks, Yolei," the little boy told her, "Good night."

+-9

Back in the park, after all the pleasantries were done away with, Matt and the others were informed about what was going on in the Digiworld. From the Digimon Emperor to Nibimon, they left nothing out.

"'Digi-armor Energize', huh?" Matt asked, mulling the words and their possible meanings over in his mind.

"It was a form of Digivolving I've never seen before," Tai said, "Somehow, it allowed Gatomon to Digivolve, but Agumon and the others couldn't do it."

"But why only Kari and Gatomon?" Sora asked.

"Not just Kari," TK said, "A couple of kids from my new building, Cody and Yolei, also got new Digivices."

Kari then held up hers for the others to see, showing them how the device had changed.

"Well, if they've got Digivices, I guess that makes them the new Digidestined," Joe said.

"That was my thought," Izzy said, "but that still doesn't explain why the Digivolutions are blocked, or why Gatomon was able to evolve."

"I can't explain everything," Lucy piped up, "But I can make an educated guess."

The tech genius looked to the pink haired girl and nodded, "What do you think happened?"

"Well, for the Digivolutions, I have an idea why the normal method doesn't work any more. Our Digivices should act as a conduit for our energy, giving it to our digimon and forcing a temporary evolution on them until the need for that form has passed. Since the danger, food consumption and energy levels obviously aren't the problem, it's gotta be in the Digivices. Whatever the Digimon Emperor is doing, it's blocking the signal from our Digivices that activates Digivolutions," Lucy said, remembering all she'd learned about this stuff from Gennai, "I don't know if that's what's happening, but it's all I've got."

"That sounds reasonably well thought out," the fourteen year old boy said, "I can look into that on our next trip to the Digiworld. But what about the Armor Digivolving?"

"That's another matter entirely," the pink haired girl said, "Without having seen it happen myself, I can only guess, but if it's like the stories Gennai told me, it goes like this," she took a breath and said, "Regular Digivolution causes our digimon to evolve on a predetermined route. Like Agumon, from his Rookie Level to his Mega Level, he's still a dinosaur type digimon. Even Skullgreymon," that had a shudder passing through the group, "Creepy as he was, he was still a dinosaur. But Armor Digivolving is like giving them a force multiplier. It still changes their form, but instead of taking the prescribed route, it takes a turn in one direction or another, most usually based on an element. Nibimon is clearly fire. Kari's energy, instead of activating her Digivice directly, interacted with the Digi-egg of Courage. That done, the Digivice isn't used as a conduit anymore, just a laser pointer, advising the egg to empower Gatomon instead of whichever digimon just happened to be nearby. The new Digivice might be the only one capable of this process, so that's why Tai's Digivice didn't react to the egg at all. I couldn't tell you why it didn't just change his like it did for Kari, but I bet Cody and Yolei will have their own digimon somewhere in the Digiworld, with their own Digi-eggs that will allow them to evolve like Gatomon."

"Hmm..." Izzy bowed his head in thought, going over what information Lucy and the others had revealed to him.

"Now I've got a question," Sora said, "With the Digimon Emperor gathering up digimon and making them his slaves, will Biyomon and the others be safe?"

"I got an email from Mimi earlier," Kari said, "She was asking the same question."

Matt looked at the girls for a moment before frowning, "I think we should just go there and do things our way."

"We can't," Izzy said, bowing his head now, "I went back to check the computer and the gate was already closed," he cut his eyes to Lucy, whose green eyes had widened considerably, "I'm sorry, Lucy. If I had even an inkling-"

"No," the girl said, closing her eyes, "It's okay. No one knew that would happen, " she opened them again, "Besides, we haven't solved the problem yet, the Digimon Emperor is still getting his way there. I can guarantee that there's a way to get back. We'll just have to figure it out, tomorrow."

"Right," Izzy said, "I'll be going back first thing tomorrow morning, to see if the gate has opened up again.

"I'm going with you," Tai said, a smile on his face.

"And so am I," Sora volunteered next.

TK and Kari nodded, matching looks of determination on their faces.

"Don't count me out," Lucy said, a small grin on her face, "This world is nice and all, but I've gotta get back home."

"I can't go," Joe sighed, "I've got an oral test tomorrow on laryngitis."

"Yeah, and my band's got a big concert coming up, so we have to practice," Matt said dejectedly.

Tai hopped to his feet with a grin, "Don't worry about it, guys," he said, "Leave everything to us."

"Okay," the blonde teen conceded, "But let us know if you need us."

"Will do."

+-9

The next morning, Izzy was the first one to make it to the computer room. He turned on the computer they had used last time, bringing up the gate. The screen on it was still red, indicating it was closed.

"Just like I thought," the boy said aloud, "I'll have to figure out a way to open it, or we wont be able to help our digimon."

"Izzy!" Yolei's voice exclaimed, "What are you doing here?"

"Oh, hi," the tech genius greeted the girl and Cody, who had come with her, "I was trying to get more information on what happened here yesterday."

Cody spoke then, "I couldn't sleep last night. I kept thinking about what you told us. Izzy, will you take me with you to the Digital World?"

"I can't," the boy began, turning back to the screen, "'cause the gate is- huh?" the boy interrupted himself, the gate making a musical beep. The image had gone from the red of being closed to rolling hills covered in green grass, "Look! It's open!"

At just that moment, Kari, TK and Lucy came into the computer room, Sora and Tai right behind them.

"Good morning, everyone," Lucy said with a friendly smile.

"Hi!" Sora greeted.

"Good, you're all here," Izzy said, then grinned at Lucy, "Good news. The gate is open again."

"Oh?" the pink haired girl smiled brightly, "What caused it to do that? Not that I'm complaining."

"I might have a theory about that," the teen said, "Kari, Yolei, Cody, would you please show us your Digivices?"

"Sure," Yolei shrugged holding out her red one, then Cody held out his blue one, Kari holding out hers now.

"Wow," Sora said, "Your weren't kidding, they've really got them. Welcome to the team!"

"Thank you," Cody said.

"So, that's what those lights became when I touched the Digi-egg," Tai surmised.

"Yes," Izzy said, typing away at the computer, "And they might be the catalyst for opening the gate. It had remained closed until just after Cody and Yolei arrived," he turned to the three kids with the new Digivices, "Yours might be the only way to open the gate to the Digiworld."

"Well, what are we standing around here for?" Yolei asked with a big smile, "I say, let's get going!"

"Hold on," the tech genius said, moving to another computer, "While we're in a controlled setting, we should conduct a few simple experiments before getting this show on the road," he moved to another computer, "I immediately went to this computer because it was the one we used yesterday, but we should see if any of the others have active gates." He turned it on, bringing up all of the programs he could, but finding nothing of the sort. He repeated this three times, before coming back to the rest of the group. "The gate appears to only be active on this terminal. We may need to quarantine it from the rest of them, tell the students that it's out of order or something. We wouldn't want someone to discover this, think it's some kind of system bug and delete it."

"Yeah, that would be bad news on a big scale," Lucy said.

"Now, let's get going," Kari said, stepping up as the new leader of the group, "We've got a world to see." The other kids all nodded, getting ready to grab their Digivices.

"Tai Kamiya! Is that you?" The group turned around, aside from one, to see who spoke, "I haven't seen you in a while." The man that spoke was very familiar to the old group, with his glasses and brown hair.

Lucy, the only one in the group who hadn't turned to look, seemed to have disappeared. If any were to chance a look around, it would almost appear as if she had never been there to start with.

"Mister Fujiyama?" Tai question incredulously.

The man walked into the room with a smile on his face, "And Sora and Izzy are both here, as well. Didn't you all graduate?"

Lucy had actually moved the moment she heard someone coming, hiding under a desk towards the middle of the class. Izzy, who had seen her move just before their old teacher came in, was impressed. Yesterday's display was nothing to the acrobatics she displayed just a moment ago, leaping over two rows of computers, table and all, with nary a sound for her landing. And she did it practically from a standing position, too. Very impressed.

"Yeah, we did," the wild haired teen said to their ex-teacher, "And what are you doing here?"

"I'm the new head of the Computer Club," he said, putting his hands on his hips with a smile.

"Huh?" the teens all spoke together, "But what do you know about using computers?"

The man chuckled, "Not a single thing." The kids sighed in relief, glad to know that he wouldn't be able to spot the gate for what it was and blow their cover.

Tai then moved forward, a grin on his face, "I just remembered, there's something I've been meaning to talk to you about, Mister Fujiyama, you got a minute?" He began pulling the man out of the computer room insistently, giving the man little else in the way of options but to agree.

"Well, sure," the man said, "What is it?"

"Er, I've been having problems adjusting to high school and, uh, it's the girls. They're so much older," he laughed nervously. The last thing the group saw of Tai was him flashing them the victory sign behind the teacher's back.

"Thanks, Tai, we owe ya," Sora said.

"Right," Izzy nodded, "Let's get going. Lucy, it's safe to come out now."

The pink haired girl crawled out from under the desk, grinning a little sheepishly, "Sorry about that. I just figured it was easier to hide than come up with a plausible story for why I was here."

"That's alright," Kari assured the teen, "But it's time to get this show on the road," she held up her Digivice to the gate, prompting the others to do the same. A bright flash of blue-white light and the group was gone.

In transit, most of the kids remained exactly as they had been in the computer room, but for Cody and Yolei, a minor transformation happened. The girl had gone from a modest dress and a bandanna over her hair to wearing a bright red beret, a white shirt, and red pants, hiking boots on her feet and a pair of fingerless red gloves on her hands.

Cody's was a little simpler, the boy going from wearing a blue turtleneck to a grey one, his pants going from dark brown to royal blue. His shoes hadn't even changed.

"Is everyone okay?" Izzy asked after they materialized.

"Better than ever," Lucy said, taking a deep breath and enjoying the beautiful sky, dotted here and their with pink, orange and yellow motes of light, just like it usually was in the mornings. The motes would change to whites and blues as the day wore on, then back to oranges, reds and purples as the sun set. What was more, the very landscape seemed to reflect the odd lighting, making it quite the sight to see.

"Wow," Cody breathed, "So, this is the Digital World," then he noticed what he was wearing had changed, "Hey, wait! I'm wearing different clothes, and they're pretty comfortable, too!"

"Hey!" Yolei grinned, "I'm dressed like I'm part of the cool crowd!" she adjusted her beret after looking down at herself, "Wait 'til I tell my sister I got free clothes!"

A short distance away, Sora stood with rest of the group watching the girl and young boy marvel over their new duds, "Kids today, they have no sense of values," the sixteen year old said, "When I was their age, I showed a _lot_ more respect whenever I received a gift."

Kari couldn't keep the amusement off her face as she said, "Sora, I hate to say this, but you're sounding just like my mom!"

The older girl just grinned down at Kari, before walking forward, "Well, let's see about finding our digimon, okay? Make sure they're safe." The others followed with her, Izzy right beside her as they began to call out the names of their digimon, "Biyomon!"

"Tentomon!" Izzy yelled next, his hands over his mouth.

+-9

Deep in his lair, the Digimon Emperor laughed imperiously. All around him, the multiple screens showed the group of Digidestined walking through a field of grass, looking for their digimon partners.

"I've been waiting for you to get here," he told the group, though they couldn't hear him, "Now, let the games begin," a smirk grew across his face that meant no good for anyone, "Snimon, attack!"

From the cells in his dungeon, the insectoid digimon growled. Like the day before, he was lifted to the surface on a platform. Once in the open air, the mantis digimon began to beat his wings faster and faster until they were abuzz with motion, lifting him into the air. Interpreting the signals from the Dark Ring around his middle, the bug flew off to do his master's bidding.

+-9

"Come on out, Sky!" Lucy shouted over the area, "I've got some new friends for you to meet!" she brushed back a lock of pink hair that was getting in her eyes before holding her fingers in her mouth and giving a sharp whistle.

In return, the group heard two reply shrieks, and then something blue with green wings appeared just out of the underbrush.

"Lucy!" Skymomon called out, smiling happily. It may have only been for a single night, but the monkey missed her partner. She dove through the air, and Lucy braced herself, catching her digimon with a grin.

"Hey, Sky," the pink haired teen said, "Did you have fun with the other digimon?"

"Yep, Gatomon and Patamon told ghost stories," the monkey looked over her shoulder, "They should be right behind me. With Biyomon and Tentomon, too."

Just as promised, the four digimon came over a hill and cheered when they saw their human partners.

"Tentomon!" Izzy exclaimed, running forward to meet the red beetle.

Sora was not far behind him, "Biyomon!"

"Izzy!" the bug digimon cried happily, embracing his partner, "You're a sight for big, green, sore eyes!"

"Biyomon!" Sora said again, nuzzling against the pink bird digimon.

"I missed you, Sora," the bird told her, enjoying the warmth of her human again.

"I missed you, too," the red headed teen said, reveling in the moment.

TK and Kari moved forward to meet their digimon as a cloud moved over them, temporarily blocking out the sun. The kids thought nothing of it, even as Lucy moved over to the two newbies to the team.

Cody and Yolei were looking a little slack jawed. No one could blame them, either. The only thing that had stopped the original group from going completely catatonic when they first met their digimon was the fact that they were so friendly. Well, that and the fact that they all had one of their very own.

"Don't worry," Lucy told the newest members of the Digidestined, "They only bite the bad guys."

Before they could even voice their thoughts on the matter, the cloud finally passed, leaving behind the shadow of a humongous bug digimon with blades for hands.

Snimon descended from the sky, all bad attitude and wicked blades. He moved towards the closest target, which just happened to be Sora and Biyomon.

"Move!" TK yelled, tackling the two to the ground even as everyone else ducked under the low flying digimon.

Their partners leapt into action then, the Rookies powering up their attacks.

"_Spiral Twister!_" Biyomon's attack manifested as a swirling line of green fire that spun through the air at Snimon.

"_Boom Bubble!_" Patamon inflated himself momentarily, then condensed the air into a sphere and spit it out like a bullet.

"_Super Shocker!_" Tentomon's attack started as a static charge in his wings. It quickly built to critical mass and leapt out at the preying mantis digimon.

"_Whirlwind Fist!_" Skymomon went last of the group of Rookies, a pastel green twister surrounding her right arm that she then launched at the enslaved insect.

It was all for not. Snimon was just to fast. He danced around their attack like they were moving in slow motion.

"_Lightning Paw!_" Gatomon leapt forward at that last second, smashing one clawed paw into the creatures forehead. Unfortunately, without her tail ring to amplify her abilities, she was about as much use as the Rookies. Snimon just batted her aside with the flat side of his bladed arms.

"Gatomon!" Kari cried, going over to the white cat digimon, "Are you okay?"

"I'm sorry, Kari, but without my tail ring, I might as well not even be a Champion," the cat told her dejectedly.

Kari just frowned, feeling the weight of her brother's goggles on her neck, "Then it's time to Armor Digivolve." The preteen Kamiya pulled her Digivice off her hip.

Before she could even speak the activation phrase, the ground right beside her collapsed in on itself. The girl tumbled helplessly down the pit, only barely managing to grab hold of a protruding rock and catch herself. And luckily for her, she was able to do so before falling into the clutches of a giant mole digimon with drills for fingers and an even bigger drill for a nose. His teeth were sharp, his eyes glowed red, and there was a Dark Ring around his left fore leg.

"Drimogemon lives deep inside the cavities of the Digital World," Tentomon explained, "His Drill Spin attack will make you _wish_ you were at the dentist's!"

"Kari!" Gatomon called down to her partner, "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine," the girl said, not sounding too sure of that prognosis, "I'm just... hanging out," she quipped despite the situation.

And it was only going to get worse.

From the forest nearby a giant ball of grey fur with glowing res eyes, muscular arms, stubby legs and huge fists and feet pushed aside a couple of the trees like they were curtains. One its left wrist was another Dark Ring.

"Mojyamon is a frosty digimon from the snowy mountains," Tentomon showed his encyclopedic knowledge of digimon again, "His Bone Boomerang attack will make your head spin!"

"_Bone Boomerang!_" the furry digimon threw a bone, bent in the middle like an actual boomerang, connecting with Gatomon and knocking her into the pit as well.

"Gatomon! No!" Kari cried, latching onto her partner's paw. Unfortunately, that added just enough weight to the rock she was holding onto for it to come loose and drop them into the clutches of the giant mole digimon. It seemed to crush them with one paw before sinking back into the darkness.

Yolei sank to her knees, quivering, Cody right next to her.

"The ground just opened up and swallowed them," the purple haired girl said, in shock.

"I wanna go home now," Cody said clenching his fists in his fear.

TK dashed past them, "Kari!" He had just made it to the lip of the hole when a thin, but surprisingly strong, arm hauled him back, "Let me go! We have to save Kari!"

"No," Lucy said calmly, "We have to get Yolei and Cody out of danger, first."

"But Kari-"

"Kari's got Gatomon and Armor Digivolving," the pink haired teen interrupted, "Cody and Yolei don't even have digimon yet. Are you really going to leave them alone right now?"

TK sighed then shook his head, "No, we can't. You're right," he turned to the others, "We've gotta get out of here. Unless one of our digimon can Digivolve, we're only going to get ourselves hurt, or worse, by staying out in the open." Even as he spoke, the Digimon were still attacking Snimon and Mojyamon, but were doing nothing aside from distracting them.

"Right," Sora said, placing hands on Cody and Yolei's shoulders, "We have to get you two out of here. Come on."

"Lucy, what are you doing?" Izzy asked, watching as the fourteen year old seemed to be stretching.

"I didn't let TK go down there caused he'd just fall into the same trap as Kari. Me? I can get down there and back up before Drimogemon even thinks of looking behind him," Lucy looked at him with a serious gaze for a moment, "If you go north of here there will be a pyramid, like the ancient Aztec used to build. It wont be perfect, but it's better than staying here. Catch ya later." With a grin and a wave, the pink haired girl turned and made a running leap into a front flip, diving down into the hole, chasing after their friend. Skymomon dropped in right behind her, unwilling to leave her human to face whatever was down there alone.

Mojyamon and Snimon began to close in on the children, growling menacingly. The Rookies weren't able to distract them for long without taking unnecessary risks.

"I wanna go home," Yolei whimpered, fearful tears gathering in her eyes, "I wanna go home!"

+-9

Some time later, when Kari regained consciousness, she found herself shackled to a cliff side by metal cuffs screwed directly into the rock and allowing for no movement from her arms or legs. Looking around, all she could see was more rocky terrain from hundreds of feet up.

"Where am I?" the girl asked, not expecting an answer, but getting one anyway.

"You're just hangin' out," the voice of a young man said mockingly, using the very words she'd said earlier.

"Who are you?" the girl demanded with a frown, tilting her head back to look up at the speaker.

The blue haired boy just chuckled, "I'm your worst nightmare, come to life," he grinned from his position down at her, "Frankly, I'm disappointed that I was able to catch you so easily."

"You caught..." Kari gasped then glared up at him, "You're the Digimon Emperor!"

"Speaking," he nodded, his smirk growing.

"You really are a human," the girl breathed, "And a kid, too."

"Ha! I'm not just an ordinary human," he threw his arms out to the side dramatically, "I am the rightful ruler of this world. The only one with the ability and the will to bring it to heel."

"Like I haven't heard that before," the brown haired girl grumbled, then demanded, "Where's Gatomon?"

"Oh, I was hoping you'd ask," he snapped his fingers, the sound echoing down into the crevasse.

A section of the cliff side opposite from Kari opened up and Gatomon was pushed forward on a slab of stone, similarly shackled, even her tail bolted down.

"Gatomon!" the girl exclaimed.

"Kari!" the cat called back, "Uh," she looked around, trying to think of something to say, "How's it hanging?"

Kari couldn't help the momentary smile, then said, "Quick, Gatomon, Armor Digivolve!"

"Yes," the Emperor said from his place, "Please do," then reached into his pocket, "After all, I'd love to see how you'd do that, without these," he held up Kari's D-terminal and Digivice. He began cackling at their misfortune, even as both cat and girl glared fiercely at him.

None of them saw it as Lucy, her hood pulled up over her head, overlooked the whole proceeding from a slightly higher vantage point than Kari. There was a barely noticeable outcropping of rock above and below her that hid her from everyone's eyes, giving her time to pull out her D-Terminal and begin writing a message to the others.

+-9

TK and the others had managed to escape from the controlled digimon, with surprisingly little difficulty. It almost seemed like they lost interest in them, allowing the kids and their digimon to scramble into the forest, moving in the direction that Lucy had told them.

Sora and Izzy were at the front, TK at the back. Their digimon were keeping vigilant watch for another attack. Cody and Yolei were walking between them, just to make sure they stayed safe. They'd been at it for a little while now, but there had been no sign of the pyramid yet.

They were all set to keep going until the two newest Digidestined heard their Digivices start to beep rapidly.

"Hey, this thing is starting to make noise," Cody said, he and Yolei holding theirs before them.

"My Digivice is going off, too," TK said, "I think something's nearby." The beeping spread to Sora and Izzy's Digivices, all their screens lighting up with the simplistic map they used to use to find each other when lost.

"It looks like a building," Sora commented.

"Hmm?" Biyomon looked up at the hovering Tentomon, "There are no buildings around here."

"No," Tentomon said, "But there is the pyramid."

"You mean, the one Lucy mentioned?" Izzy asked.

"Yeah," Tentomon nodded, "It used to have digimon coming and going all the time."

"But it closed down," Biyomon told them.

"They just couldn't book enough wedding's or Bar Mitzvahs," the bug digimon explained.

"Well, something in there is making our Digivices react, and I don't think it's the caterers," Sora told them, moving forward, "Let's go."

It's didn't take them very long to find the pyramid at all, looking just like Lucy said it would. There was a long staircase on the front that went all the way to the top. The kids started up it immediately, though not all of them were happy about it.

"I'm exhausted!" Yolei proclaimed as they reached a landing near the top, "Hasn't anyone here heard of escalators?"

"Look at it this way, Yolei," Biyomon said, turning back to look at the purple haired girl, "Only a few more steps to go." The bird digimon gestured to the last flight of stairs before them, leading another forty feet up to a pair of twin pedestals.

Once at the top, despite the purple haired girl's weary sigh of resignation, they all stopped for a quick breather. They were quick to spot the objects resting on the pedestals.

"They look like Digi-eggs," Sora said. Indeed they did, though not quite like the traditional Digi-eggs one might find in Primary Village. The one on the right was white and had two wings protruding from the sides. The one on the left, was yellow and almost looked like the carapace of an insect.

"These must have been what our Digivices have been reacting to," Cody suggested.

"Look!" the sixteen year old girl said, leaning a little closer to the white one, "This one has the Crest of Love on it!"

"And that one has the Crest of Knowledge," Izzy pointed out on the yellow egg. The two teens looked at each other and nodded before moving forward. Izzy grabbed the yellow one and Sora the white one and then they began to pull with all their might, trying to lift them up. But, just like Tai and the Digi-egg of Courage, it was for naught.

"It's no use," Sora sighed.

"We can't move them," the tech genius agreed. Then he blinked, looking back at Yolei and Cody. He remembered what Tai had said. He hadn't been able to move the egg with his crest on it, either, but Kari had. The only thing that separated Kari from the rest of the old Digidestined was her new Digivice, the model that was in the same series as the two newest members'.

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking, Izzy?" the sixteen year old asked her friend.

"I believe so. Cody, Yolei, I believe these Digi-eggs are not ours to move, but yours," the other teenager said.

"Really?" Yolei blinked, "You want us to try it?" she held a hand to her chest in question.

"Uh, okay," the young boy said, "No harm trying." The two of them moved forward, and gripped the eggs just like the older kids had. They prepared for a bit of a struggle.

And with an audible 'pop!' the eggs came loose with the lightest of tugs, getting the kids and digimon to gasp appreciatively.

"They lifted them so easily," Sora commented on a breath.

"Just like Kari did, yesterday," TK added.

Then, from the pedestals that had held the eggs, red and purple electricity began to spark wildly, before turning into pure streams of light. From the red light a new digimon formed. It looked somewhat like a bald eagle. It had a body covered in red feathers, wings that ended in three black claws each, and big blue eyes. Its head was covered in with feathers with a black belt around its forehead that held a single feather up on the back, red with a yellow tip. Just underneath its eyes and on it's forehead were red markings.

The digimon floated there for a moment before opening it's yellow beak and saying, "Ah! It feels so good to be get out from under that stuffy rock and spread my wings!"

The other column of light solidified into a digimon as well. It was yellow from head to toe, had a tail and seemed to walk on all fours. It had wing like ears on the side of its head, amber eyes, and armor plating on its back and legs. Each of its paws ended in grey claws, perfect for digging.

"Aw, why'd ya have to wake me up?" the digimon drawled with a slight Texas accent, "I was havin' such a nice dream."

"Whoa," was the consensus of the kids and digimon present, especially Cody and Yolei.

The bird digimon walked up to the purple haired girl in the red beret, "Greetings, my name is Hawkmon, and I've been waiting to make your acquaintance."

"Uh, you talking to me?" Yolei asked, almost unable to believe such a thing was happening.

A few feet away, the yellow digimon yawned loudly, covering his mouth with one paw so as not to be rude, before he turned to Cody, "Wowee, I think my shell fell asleep," he grinned, "I'm Armadillomon and you and I are partners."

"Er, well..." the eight year old wasn't sure how to respond to that. What does one say when a digital armadillo tells you... well, anything?

"So, Yolei, you and I shall be working together as a team," Hawkmon said.

"What?" the girl's brow furrowed and she stepped backwards, "I don't fight, except with my sister, over who gets the last cookie." The fear was clear on the girls face. She thought this was supposed to be a game, a theme park. It was supposed to be fun, not dangerous.

"What?" the bird digimon squawked, "You refuse to fight? Harrumph! Why do I get stuck with the defective human?"

"Yolei," Sora said softly, placing her hands over the younger girl's.

"What is it, Sora?" she looked into the red head's gentle smile and already began to calm down.

"I have a friend. Her name is Mimi, and she's a lot like you," she remembered the girl in question, "She always said that she didn't want to fight either, even though she knew that she had to, for the Digital World. And for us. Yolei, the more you do to help your digimon, the closer the two of you will become. And that's a bond you will carry with you for the rest of your life."

Yolei looked down at the egg in her hands, thinking about what the older girl had said.

Sora smiled a little wider and squeezed the other girls hands, "And you have another friend for life, too. Me."

Yolei couldn't help the grin that crossed her face then. Maybe... Maybe this wouldn't be so bad after all.

"So," Izzy said, moving over to the youngest member of the group, "What do you think of the Digital World so far, Cody?"

"I don't know," the boy said, "I've only been here for a short time."

"Well, you must have some sort of opinion," the teenager urged him.

"I normally try not to make up my mind about something until I have all the information, but this place is so new to me," he kept his gaze firmly on the floor, "There are so many unanswered questions. I'm afraid I don't know where to start."

"You seem like a curious kid," Izzy grinned, "who just wants to know all the facts. Sounds like someone I know."

"What should I do?" Cody asked, looking up at his elder for guidance.

"Do just what I did," Izzy told him. In the background, TK and the digimon smiled brightly, seeing the older Digidestined reaching out to the younger. "Just trust your instincts. And if there's a problem you can't solve, just come to me. You and I will solve it together."

"Okay!" finally the eight year old smiled.

As one, both Cody and Yolei turned to regard their new digimon, smiling much more confidently.

"Alright, we'll do it!" the purple haired girl said, "We'll fight together!"

"Splendid! Magnificent!" Hawkmon gushed.

"I promise to do my best," the boy proclaimed.

"I'm with ya," Armadillomon drawled.

Just then, TK's D-terminal let off a musical tone and vibrated in his pocket. He quickly pulled it out and flipped it open.

"It's a message from Lucy!" the blonde announced, "'I've found Kari and Gatomon. His High Jerkness has them at Round Rock Canyon. Send Reinforcements ASAP!'" he looked up at the others, "We have to go get them!"

Cody and Yolei looked at one another, then at their digimon, the Digi-eggs of Love and Knowledge beginning to glow in their hands.

"I beg your pardon," Hawkmon said, holding up one wing, "but to make us Armor Digivolve, you must say the words 'Digi-armor Energize'."

Together, the new Digidestined spoke, "Digi-armor Energize!"

"Hawkmon, Armor Digivolve to..." the egg dissolved into a storm of silver and light green wind, quickly obscuring Hawkmon from view, "Halsemon! The Wings of Love!" Halsemon was the size of a large horse, had four legs and a short tail. His four feet were birdlike and clawed. From just over his shoulders he had a set of wings that were reminiscent of his Rookie form. On his head was a large helmet that resembled the Digi-egg that allowed him to Digivolve, two large, silver metal wings sticking out over his other pair. His eyes were still blue and his beak was still sharp.

The armored digimon turned to Yolei, "I am an armored digimon. As Hawkmon, I used the Digi-egg of Love to Armor Digivolve! I use my Tempest Wing attack to defeat my enemies!" His voice was much deeper now as well.

"Armadillomon, Armor Digivolve to..." the egg in Cody's hand disappeared in purple light, just as a rock cocoon formed up around his digimon in the vague shape of his next evolution before three drills broke out of it causing it to crumble away from his new form, "Digmon! The Drill of Knowledge!" Digimon was about the same size as Nibimon had been. He had green eyes, four arms, and a blue chest. The rest of his body was covered in bright yellow armor, and on his back was a pair of vestigial wings. His top set of arms ended, not in claws, but a pair of drills on each, another large drill coming from his nose.

Cody was awed by what the little digimon had turned into.

"I, too, am an armored digimon!" his voice was deeper, but his drawl remained, "As Armadillomon I used the Digi-egg of Knowledge to Armor Digivolve! Now, what do you say we go find the others?"

+-9

Back at Round Rock Canyon, Kari continued to glare up at the Digimon Emperor.

"What? No pitiful cries for help? No demands to return your Digivice? I must say I'm rather disappointed all around," the blue haired boy gloated, "I honestly expected more. Weren't you going to, oh, how did you put it? Yes! Weren't you going to 'slap a Dark Ring on me'?" he laughed maliciously at the absurd thought of it all.

Kari almost growled, "You'll be sorry when my friends get here."

"Oh, and what do you think they'll do to stop me?" his grin couldn't have been more arrogant if he tried, "Yell nasty things at me? Curse my name? You're all helpless before me!" He snapped his fingers and a dark ring floated down into the gap between Kari and Gatomon, "And even should they muster up some way to fight, they'll be far too busy with your precious digimon to even think about me."

"Gatomon!" Kari cried, seeing the ring close in on her digimon, "Leave her alone!"

In her hiding place, Lucy was crouched down, watching the proceedings with her teeth clenched. This jerk was really getting on her nerves. She was actually curling her fists so tight that her knuckles were turning white.

_Damn it, where is everyone? If they don't show up soon, I'm going to have to jump in and do something myself!_ the pink haired teen thought, her legs quivering to do something.

The Dark Ring closed in on Gatomon, coming within four feet of the struggling cat digimon before something happened that captured everyone's attention.

"_Tempest Wing!_" Twin beams of red light came from Kari's right and slammed into the ring, blowing it up before it could get any closer.

"What was that?!" the Digimon Emperor barked.

"Kari! Hold on!" Yolei shouted, riding along on Halsemon's back.

"Yolei!" the younger girl called back, "Save Gatomon!"

Even as the girl spoke, the rock around Gatomon began to crack and break, then shattered into digital bits as Digmon broke through the rock, catching Gatomon with his smaller arms and holding her close.

"Sorry to bust in on ya like this," the yellow digimon said.

"Great!" the Digimon Emperor said sarcastically, turning around to leave.

But before he could even take a step, he found a blue monkey in his path, a frown on her face.

"And where do you think you're going?" Skymomon asked.

Rushing in front of the Emperor was a little green digimon with several legs, a spinneret at the end of his tail and a mouth that opened vertically.

"Leave him alone!" the worm demanded, leaping at the monkey.

"Yah!" Skymomon twisted around, kicking the worm right back where it came from. He hit the Emperor in the stomach, temporarily knocking him off balance. And, in the blue haired boy's flailing to remain standing he lost hold of Kari's Digivice and D-terminal.

"Yoink!" Lucy jumped up over the ledge of the cliff, snagged the devices, and back flipped off again to land on Halsemon's back with Yolei, "Thanks for playing!" she stuck her tongue out at him.

"Grah!" the Digimon Emperor all but roared in anger before turning to Skymomon. He pulled out his whip, lashing it forward.

The monkey tried to dodge, but it wrapped around her middle and he yanked her back, throwing her over the edge.

"Snimon!" he called out, "Mojyamon! Drimogemon!" One by one, the three Champion level digimon appeared, each of them with vicious growls in their throats.

At the bottom of the canyon, Kari hopped down from Digmon's grip, the digimon having rescued her as well.

"I think these belong to you, Miss Kamiya," Lucy said with a grin, handing over the stolen devices.

"Thanks, Lucy, everyone!" she then turned to her digimon, "You ready, Gatomon?"

"Born ready," the cat assured her.

"Digi-armor Energize!" Kari cried out. An orange beam shot out from her D-terminal, where the egg was stored, collided with her new Digivice, and a storm of fire moved to envelope her digimon.

"Gatomon, Armor Digivolve to Nibimon!"

Snimon approached at great speed, ready to take the fight to the kids.

Halsemon was ready though, "You'd better hold on tight, Yolei.

"Okay!" the girl said with an excited grin.

With a grunt of effort, the red digimon lifted into the sky and shot towards the insect.

"Let's turn it up a few degrees!" Nibimon said, glaring at Mojyamon.

"Leave Drimogemon to me, ya'll," Digmon advised before drilling into the earth after his intended target.

Mojyamon stomped forward, holding an icicle the size of a large club in his hand, "_Ice Cloud!_" He threw it like a spear.

Nibimon stepped up, the balls of fire on her tails growing to the size of beach balls, "_Twin Tail Inferno!_" her tails lashed her hands, covering them in the flames, then she dashed forward, catching the huge ice spike and melting it into so much water. In the span of a second she was right before the mountain dwelling digimon. She ducked under one sloppy blow before smashing both fists into the Dark Ring on his left arm in two lightning fast jabs, shattering the device.

"Alright!" Kari cheered, "One down, two to go!"

In the air above them, Snimon was just getting his attack up and going, "_Twin Sickles!_" the pink lashes of energy flew forward one at a time, allowing Halsemon to dodge them by doing a barrel roll. Yolei couldn't help but scream at that though, her hands desperately clutching at his feathers.

"_Tempest Wing!_" the four legged digimon yelled once they were within close enough distance that Snimon couldn't dodge, then darting to the side before he could be countered. The red beams easily cut into the ring while leaving Snimon whole and healthy, destroying the enslavement device.

"You did it, Halsemon!" Yolei gushed.

Finally, deep in the earth, Drimogemon was making incredible headway, cutting through the hard rock like it was warm butter. He finally broke into an open chamber and growled dangerously when he saw Digmon already there, waiting for him.

"I guess we're the drill team," the yellow digimon said, "_Gold Rush!_" he pulled his arms into a cross shape before him then lashed them outwards, all five drills on his body, the two on each hand and the one on his snout, screaming through the air like rockets and exploding on contact with Drimogemon. The Dark Ring didn't even stand a chance.

+-9

While the digimon had been fighting, the Digimon Emperor had been able to sneak away, back to his lair, where he could watch the battles from a safe distance.

Despite the loss, he couldn't help chuckling, "It seems they're better than I thought. This will make things a lot more interesting." He began to rapidly run numbers across his screen, bringing up new scenarios, more pictures of digimon, quantifying their stats and how to best use them. He was only just beginning to get into the game.

+-9

"I hope you're not too angry at us," Kari said apologetically, "But fighting you was the only way we could get rid of the Dark Rings."

"It's okay," Mojyamon said, Snimon and Drimogemon standing before the Digidestined with him, "Thanks for saving us," they turned to leave, "Being the Emperor's slave is the worst! All day long it's 'destroy this', 'destroy that', 'get me a cappuccino', oy!"

Lucy smiled as they left, almost giggling at that last comment. She could just imagine Snimon trying to make a cup of coffee with his huge bladed arms.

"So, Yolei, will I be able to count on your assistance from now on?" Hawkmon asked, turning to his partner.

Yolei grinned, putting her hands on her hips, taking a heroic pose, "Absolutely! One hundred percent!"

"And will we be a team, Cody, when I'm not nappin'?" Armadillomon asked next.

"Of course," the boy nodded with a bright smile, "I'd be honored to be your partner," he bowed briefly to the yellow digimon.

"Well," Sora said, getting the old group to look at her, "It looks like the new Digidestined team doesn't need us around anymore." She couldn't keep the proud grin off her face.

"I don't know. I still think we have a lot of work ahead of us," Izzy told her.

"We can still help them fight the Emperor," Biyomon piped up.

"And we can also provide them with advice and guidance," Tentomon agreed.

"What a team!" the red head smiled again.

+-9

After a short march back to were they started the day's adventure, the team found themselves before another TV set.

"You sure you don't want to come back again, Lucy?" Sora asked, "I'd love to have you over at my place for the night. I'm sure my mom wouldn't mind."

The pink haired teen just smiled and shook her head, "No, I can't right now. I've gotta get back to Gennai and give him a report on everything. Who knows, he might have some helpful advice for dealing with the Digimon Emperor."

"Alright, if you're sure," Sora said, sounding a little down.

"Hey," Lucy began, pulling her old friend into a farewell hug, "Don't be so long in the face. I promise, soon as I get back from Gennai's we'll have a girl's night out. Just you, me, and as many sappy movies as we can stand, alright?"

"Yeah," the older girl said with a smile, hugging her surrogate little sister back, "Sounds like a great plan."

"Alright, everyone, let's get going," Kari said, holding up her Digivice to the TV. The others, aside from Lucy, did the same. Soon enough, they and Hawkmon, Armadillomon, Patamon and Gatomon were all enveloped in the light of transportation between worlds. In the Transfer, Hawkmon and Armadillomon seemed to De-Digivolve into their In-Training phases.

Hawkmon turned into a little pink ball with wings and a beak, that one yellow tipped red feather still sticking out of the back of his head, while Armadillomon became a cream colored ball with fanned out ears and black eyes.

+-9

By the time the kids had finished their struggles, Tai was just finishing a very long and awkward talk with his former teacher. He was backing slowly out of the room, laughing nervously.

"Right, got it, Mister Fujiyama, the Birds and the Bees! Thanks a lot!" He closed the door to the class room they had been using and sighed in exhaustion, "He probably knows more about computers than he does about girls," the teen quipped as he trekked back to the computer room.

The elder Kamiya sibling rounded the corner just in time to see a bright flash of light and hear a great crash, followed by moans. He dashed forward, looking into the room, only to find everyone in another tangled heap, just like yesterday.

"What happened to you guys?" Tai asked.

"Please don't ask," they all said as one.

Tai looked to the computer where he could hear laughing and the gate showed Lucy holding her stomach and half curled over from giggles.

"_Oh, man! It's not any less funny from this side!_" more giggles pealed through the connection, only getting more groans from the group in the Human World.

"Hey," the wild haired teen said, looking at the small Digimon with Cody and Yolei, "The new digimon returned to their In-Training forms."

"Wow," Yolei gushed, nuzzling her digimon against her cheek, "He's so cute!"

Cody, from his spot on the floor, looked at his digimon inquisitively, "I don't understand how this little fella can turn himself into a great big creature like Digmon."

Kari just sighed, "Are we gonna have to do this every time we come back?"

"_Oh, I hope so!_" Lucy said, finally breaking through her giggles.

"Easy for you to say, Ninja Girl," TK said with a playful smile, "But at least we made it back to the Human World, safe and sound."

"Yeah," Sora nodded, "But why didn't Biyomon or Tentomon come through?"

"_They're right here,_" Lucy said, stepping aside to show the digimon in question.

"_Don't worry, Sora. We'll be safe here. The Digimon Emperor never comes out at night,_" the bird digimon told her partner.

"_The guy has all that power and he's afraid of the dark,_" Tentomon quipped.

"Well, get some rest, you'll need it for tomorrow," Sora said, smiling at her digimon on the screen, "And Lucy?"

"_Present._"

"You be careful, too, alright. None of us would want anything to happen to you, either," the sixteen year old said.

"That's right," Tai said with a grin, "Ninja skills or not, be safe."

Lucy just grinned right back, showing her pearly whites, "_Don't worry too much, I know how to stay out of the line of fire._"

"Yeah? Tell that to Wargreymon and Metalgarurumon," Tai quipped.

"_Aw, you would bring up my one dumb moment,_" the teen girl sighed, then smiled again, "_Now, you all go get some rack. We've got a big job tomorrow. After all, it's not easy to topple an empire._"

"Right!"

+-9

"Oh, I'm just shaking in my boots," the Digimon Emperor drawled to his screens, have watched the entire conversation, "I'm so very frightened."

"Don't worry, Master," the little green worm digimon said, "I'll protect you from them."

"Grr!" the Digimon Emperor whirled around, "Like you would be of any use!" he lashed his whip just to the left of the little worm, "Leave, Wormmon! I have thinking to do and your pathetic voice is becoming distracting.

"Yes, Master," Wormmon, the little digimon, said sadly, leaving the preteen to his dark thoughts.

Chapter Two: End

Please Enjoy.


	3. Chapter 3 Storm Of Friendship

So, I have been inundated with questions, and I understand that you would like them all to be answered with the utmost detail. Unfortunately, this is not the venue for that. If you want them all answered in detail you will just have to continue reading the story.

**However**, that being said, there are some I can answer right now.

**Will Lucy be a part of the team and is there a Digi-egg of Faith?** Yes.

**Does Kari still go to the Dark Ocean?** Yes.

**Why did I change the color of Cody's Digivice?** Aesthetics.

**Who get's the Digi-egg of Friendship? **TK.

The rest of the many questions that I didn't answer will be answered in the story, I promise. Answering them right now would only give you unnecessary spoilers.

Now, on with the Revolution!

+-9

Chapter Three: The Storm of Friendship

"Gennai! I'm home!" Lucy called out as she made it to the large, traditional Japanese house that Gennai had made for himself. It was very spacious, easily able to house all the current Digidestined and their digimon with rooms to spare. In particular, the pink haired teen liked the placement.

When Myotismon had been putting in his bid for power, years ago, Gennai had hidden his house in a lake. Not on it, _in_ it. It was about fifty feet from the surface, completely hidden from view, and obscured even further by a Digital Barrier. The view of the marine life was excellent.

"Gennai?" she called out again, looking up from ringing her hoodie out in the koi pond. Normally, the man was there to greet every time she returned from a job, waiting for her report and expecting a detailed survey on the lands she had traveled through. It wasn't enough that she went out and dealt with the dangers he told her about, to be a guardian, she had to be able to spot it coming on her own. He had told her that there would be times where he would be unavailable and she'd have to make the call herself, so she needed to pay attention to what was going on.

"Hey, Sky," Lucy said, turning to her soggy monkey friend, "Do you smell Gennai nearby?"

The blue digimon turned her nose to the air and inhaled deeply, "Nuh-uh," she shook her head in the negative, "I mean, nothing fresh, anyway."

Lucy stood up then, a frown of thought marring her face as she dawned her hoodie again. She took a deep breath then held it, listening for the sound of... anything. She exhaled slowly after four seconds, not picking up anything other than the usual sounds of an empty house.

"Come on, Skymomon, let's see if he's just playin' around, like last time," the monkey hopped up on Lucy's shoulder, her usual place, as the fourteen year old moved through the property, quiet as a whisper. As unlikely as it was for one of the evil digimon to get through the Digital Barrier and attack the old man, if one did, they wouldn't be the average baddie. As such, no need to go stomping through the house, alerting them to her exact location.

Twenty minutes of searching turned up nothing of the older Guardian. Not even a whiff of his cologne. Finally, she made it to the kitchen, where there was a note pinned to the refrigerator with a fish shaped magnet.

"'Lucy, I'm sure you've noticed some trouble has popped up around the continent. A human child is using a dark Digivice to try to control the Digital World. A rather ambitious goal for someone his age. But I trust you to take care of him. In case you haven't noticed, the Gates between worlds have been activated, so you may call on the others to come help. In fact, I recommend you do just that. Always remember, you are at your best when you are all together. I'd be there to help, but something even more urgent has popped up and I must attend to it swiftly, or it may come back to haunt us all. Good luck, signed Gennai'," Lucy read aloud, contemplating what that all meant.

"What do you think is so important that the Digimon Emperor isn't the worst thing out there?" Skymomon asked, looking at the little chibi drawing of Gennai, holding up a victory sign.

"Honestly, Sky, I'm not sure I wanna know," the pink haired teen said, scanning the note again, "That emperor chump is bad enough in my book, let's not invite any more trouble until we've dealt with him."

"I know what you mean," the little monkey nodded, "Do you think we should tell the others?"

"I think it can wait. We need to focus on this guy first, and Gennai is taking care of it, anyway," she still frowned at the note, though, even as she moved towards the shower. It was never as simple as 'beat this guy into paste'. You always had to worry about the next jerk that would come along to replace him.

+-9

In the human world, at the same time, a young man sat before a computer, typing like mad. Some might be surprised to find out that it wasn't Izzy, working so late. It was, instead, a young man, roughly TK and Kari's age, with blue hair and eyes. The light from the computer screen was enough to show a malicious glint in his eyes as he hit the keys so furiously.

"Just a few more adjustments," the young man said, a smirk forming, "And there. Perfect." On the screen was a familiar par of gold framed sunglasses with dark lenses.

The boy saved the program, his smirk never leaving his face as he prepared for bed.

+-9

"I think the classroom is empty," the voice of Patamon whispered to the empty Computer Room, twenty minutes after the final bell of the day rang, "I think it's safe to come out now."

"Hold on, I'm still taking a spelling test," Gatomon replied.

The tan digimon was hiding on a wall mounted ventilator at the back of the class, the cat crouched down between two plants on a shelf. Poromon and Upamon, the In-Training forms of Hawkmon and Armadillomon, hid under a desk.

"Shh!" Patamon said suddenly, "I hear someone coming!"

Through the opaque glass on the door, they were able to make out two shapes.

"Wait," Upamon said, "I know that scent."

The door slid open and in walked TK and Kari, the girl wearing her brother's goggles in place of her normal hair clip.

"TK!" Patamon said with glee as he came down from his hiding spot.

"Kari," Gatomon greeted with more aplomb.

"Hey, you two!" Kari greeted cheerfully, "Ready to get back to saving the Digital world?"

"You know it!" Patamon answered.

"Great!" TK said with a grin from behind the somewhat shorter girl.

"Wait!" Poromon chirped, "We can't leave yet! Not without Yolei!"

"And don't forget Cody!" Upamon said, bouncing in place.

"Don't worry," the brown haired girl said, "They're already on the way here."

Even as she spoke, they could hear the sound of rapid foot steps slapping against the floor.

"Sorry I'm late," Yolei's voice came from the hall as she skidded to a stop just outside the classroom, "I brought goodies from my family's convenience store to make up for it," she held up said bag after stepping in.

"Good idea," TK complimented the purple haired girl, "In-Training digimon are bottomless pits."

Yolei lay the bag down before the digimon, showing off a bunch of treats and drinks in various containers.

"I'd have brought more, but I have to pay for anything I take from the shelves and work the counter on the weekends," Yolei said, shrugging, "But it comes with a great pension plan."

"What is it?" Upamon asked looking at the things in the bag like he'd never seen them before.

"Can we eat it?" Poromon inquired, "I'm hungry!"

"Of course you can eat it," Patamon said with a smile, "Watch me!" The tan colored digimon reached into the bag for one of the drinks, pulling off the lid and sucking out the liquid swiftly, a rapturous look on his face. He tilted his head back to get to the tasty refreshment even quicker.

"The buffet is now open!" Upamon declared, jumping right into the bag, knocking Patamon on his back, not that he minded. The cream colored digimon was able to get his mouth around one of the juice packs and sucked it dry in seconds. "Oh, Wow! This is the best thing I've tasted in my entire life! All two days of it!"

With that encouragement, and with Gatomon watching the three of them, an exasperated deadpan on her face, Poromon dipped his beak in and took a drink from one for himself. After only a few seconds, his eyes glistened and his cheeks darkened to a red even through the feathers, and he beat his tiny little wings as hard as he could, lifting into the air and flitting about the room.

"It's hot! It's _hot!_ And delicious, too!" the pink digimon came back down and, together, Upamon and Poromon dove back into the treats, eating and drinking their way through the entire bag of snacks like a storm. Patamon even had to stop and stare as the two In-Training digimon even ate the cardboard box for a bit of candy.

Gatomon still had the same look on her face as she drawled, "I hope my first litter doesn't act like this."

Kari looked up from her D-terminal then, giggling at the look on her partner's face. She had been using the device to send a message to Lucy, telling the girl that they would be coming to the Digiworld soon.

"Hey, should we check to see if the gate is open while we wait for them to finish?" TK suggested.

"I've got it," Yolei said, moving over to the computer quickly. She turned it on and loaded up the desk top. Her mouth widened into a grin when the gate popped up, "Perfecto! Let's get going!"

"Hold on a moment," Kari said, "We can't leave yet. Cody's not here."

"I wonder where he is," the blonde boy said, placing a hand to his chin in thought.

"The last I saw, he was still in the lunch room, chewing his last carrot fifty times," the purple haired girl said.

+-9

Indeed, sitting in the lunch room, moving a little tomato back and forth with his fork, Cody sat there, a ponderous look on his face. One wouldn't be surprised if he had been divining the mysteries of the universe.

But he wasn't.

_I'm so stuffed,_ the boy bemoaned mentally, _but I've only got one last tomato to eat._

A short, chubby woman stood towards the back of the room, watching him with a soft smile, "You don't have to eat every bite, Cody." She had seen him do this before, working his way through his lunch relentlessly, no matter if it was just a little too much for him.

"You should never throw away food unless it smells bad," the dark haired boy said, almost as if reciting something he'd heard a thousand times, "My father used to say that before he passed away."

"Oh, I see," the woman said gently, not knowing what else to say.

The boy just went back to staring at his tomato, finally cutting it in two, pinning half with his fork and sniffing it, almost hoping it smelled funny so he didn't have to eat it.

+-9

Yolei had her eyes skyward as she contemplated her neighbor's eating habits, "You know, this could take a while, but I really don't want to leave without him either," the girl put a hand to her chin, frowning in thought. Suddenly she smiled and slapped a fist into her palm, "I know, we could watch some TV to pass the time!" She turned to the computer and pulled up the program that allowed them to watch the local channels.

"Yeah," Kari nodded, "Let's see what's on."

The purple haired girl turned up the volume, bringing up one of her favorite cartoons when the feed was interrupted by a news program.

"_We interrupt this broadcast to bring you this latest story!_" A pretty woman reporter said, standing on a street corner, "_The results from the National Computer Programming Test were just announced!_" The image of the woman cut away to show a young man with pale skin, dark blue hair and wearing a grey uniform, "_And the winner is boy genius, Ken Ichijouji!_"

The young man turned around to face the camera, showing off blue eyes a few shades lighter than his page boy cut hair, "_There were many deserving geniuses out there, and I am humbled that the judges chose me to receive the top prize._"

"_Now we go live to the site of the contest with our field reporter, Jerry Rivera! Jerry?_"

While the older kids watched the broadcast, Cody finally came into the computer room. The first thing he saw were the In-Training Digimon chomping through a bag full of of snacks, followed by Yolei, TK and Kari huddled around a computer screen.

"_Thanks, Jackie,_" the feed changed to that of a man with round glasses, a handle bar mustache and wavy brown hair that stopped just above his collar, "_Young Ken Ichijouji wowed the judges by creating a program that can actually brush your teeth for you! Rumor is, next year he's planning something with floss! I can't wait! Back to you._"

Cody ignored the news in favor of picking up Upamon, smiling brightly at his partner, the little digimon just as happy to see him.

The feed changed again to show Ken playing chess, "_Ken's talents include playing chess while everyone watches,_" it changed again to show a massive math problem, "_Just last week, he actually balanced the world's biggest check book. And that's not all! He's a champion at Judo,_" it showed a clip of the boy throwing a man twice his size like it was child's play, before switching to one of the boy wearing a green and black soccer uniform, playing against a team made up of players clearly older than him, "_and a star on the all state soccer team!_" the boy kicked, sending the ball into the goal like a cannon shot, the camera showed an almost perfect look at the calm control on his face, "_And, girls, he's single!_"

"Wow," Kari commented after seeing the boy play soccer, "He's like a younger version of Tai mixed with Izzy."

"_Now, let's talk to the proud parents who raised this genius,_" the reporter continued, standing next to a somewhat thick man in a blue suit and a kind looking woman with brown hair in a baby blue jacket, white blouse and yellow dress, "_Mister and Missus Ichijouji! What are some of the advantages of being the mother of one of the most brilliant children in the world?_" she held the mic up to the mother.

The woman smiled happily, a light dusting of pink on her cheeks, "_Oh, it's a great help in the kitchen! He invented dishes that clean themselves!_"

Then the reporter held the mic up to the boy's father, "_Like father like son,_" the man said, scratching the back of his head sheepishly, "_I once guessed how many jellybeans were held in a pickle jar._"

"I've heard of this kid," Cody said, finally paying attention, "He's so smart that, one time, he gave his _teachers_ homework."

"Cody!" Kari asked, slightly startled, "When did you get here?"

"About a minute ago," the boy said with a shrug.

"Hey," TK said suddenly, "Maybe Ken knows how to defeat the Digimon Emperor."

"Hmph!" Yolei chuffed, pressing a button to turn off the broadcast and crossing her arms with a frown, "I know more about the Digital World than that stupid kid!"

"Considering his IQ is in the high hundreds, I don't think 'stupid' is the right word," Kari said.

"Hey, Kari?" Gatomon said, coming up behind the group with Patamon right beside her.

"Yes?"

"We're ready to go back to the Digital World, now," Patamon finished.

"Alright," TK grinned, "We're all present and accounted for. Let's get going!"

"Yeah, forget all this talk about geniuses," Yolei said, smiling as well, opening the gate program.

Kari held up her pink Digivice, pointing it at the screen, "Digiport, Open!" A flash of bright light obscured the children, taking them through the divide between the worlds.

+-9

Elsewhere in Tokyo, Ken Ichijouji walked down the busy streets, listening to the prattle of the passersby as they recognized him.

"Hey, there goes that kid who won the computer contest!"

"Isn't he a boy genius?"

"I wonder if he uses the same conditioner that I do."

The boy then became aware of a puppy, yipping cutely at his feet, looking up at him with soulful brown eyes.

He looked down at it, narrowing his eyes as a dangerous glint came into them, like frosted steel, "Beat it, you mangy little mutt, or I'll call the pound." The pup yelped and ran away, recognizing the voice of a predator and the threat he represented. Ken just snickered, continuing his journey.

It only took him a few minutes to reach his modest apartment. As he walked in, he was greeted by his mother.

"Oh, Ken, you're home," she smiled at him, "I have to go to work soon, so I'll just leave your snack on the table," she nodded towards the tray in her hands that had a sandwich and a small carton of milk on it, "Oh! I bought a new label maker today. I just can't stop playing with it. I even labeled the toilet."

The blue haired boy watched her for a few moments, before groaning exasperatedly under his breath and moving towards his room without so much as a word in his mother's direction.

Missus Ichijouji watched him go, used to the silence, "Ken sure spends a lot of time in his room," she mumbled to herself.

+-9

In the Digital World, the Digimon Emperor stood before a recently created tower, another one of his creations, looking like a pure black Washington Monument. He admired it's brilliance, _his_ brilliance, for only a moment before pulling out his whip and lashing it at an Elecmon. The poor red and blue digimon scurried through the underbrush with all due haste, searching out a hiding spot.

"It's no use trying to hide from me!" the Emperor shouted, "Come out!"

For a second, there was no movement, but eventually the Elecmon did sprint away from him, getting a smirk to cross the cruel boy's face.

"Ooh, a chase. Interesting," he turned his head to one side and gave a shrill whistle.

The ground shook rhythmically, and a large green dinosaur digimon stomped its way through the forest. He had sharp teeth, glowing red eyes, two huge tusks that were striped red and black grew out of his back, and a Dark Ring around his neck. On his snout was one large horn, and several others moved down his spine to his tail.

"Let's go," the human said, "We have a little errand to run."

The dinosaur digimon leaned down, allowing the Digimon Emperor to climb aboard then scented the fleeing Elecmon.

The red and blue digimon fled for it's life, panting desperately as it ran as fast as it could. It wasn't good enough, though.

The large dinosaur digimon, Tuskmon, crashed through the forest with no difficulty what so ever, simply knocking over the trees that obstructed its path. Soon enough, Tuskmon and and the emperor were right on Elecmon's tail. The Digimon Emperor unfurled his whip again, lashing it forward with a crack.

Elecmon yelped in pain, the whip striking his left hind leg. He was relegated to dragging himself along, making even worse time on his escape. The emperor merely laughed sadistically.

"It's not as fun if I catch you right away," even so he lashed out with his whip again, wrapping it around the digimon's uninjured leg, and lifting him into the air.

+-9

A short time later, the Digimon Emperor sat on a throne of black stone, overlooking a pit filled with cages. Each cage had iron bars and held digimon, half of them had the red glow in their eyes of the Dark Rings. The other half were just frightened beyond belief. Seconds ago, the human had dropped his captured Elecmon into one of the cages.

He didn't notice it as he was observed by a small group of Gotsumon, the rock digimon.

"He captured another digimon," one of them whispered.

"He'll change once he puts one of those Dark Rings around him," another one said.

"If he tries to catch us, he's got rocks in his head," the third commented.

"Then again, so do we," the middle one stated.

"We've gotta run," the first insisted.

"We can't abandon our friend, Elecmon," the third said, looking back at him.

Even as they spoke, another Elecmon, held enslaved by a Dark Ring marched into the arena, growling, the cage door for the recently captured electric digimon rose, and the enslaved digimon rushed inside. A few seconds later, they both rolled out, a flurry of fur and claws.

The emperor chuckled as he watched them fight for his amusement.

"He's making them fight each other," one of the Gotsumon gasped.

"Digimon should be friends. They'd never hurt each other if they weren't under his evil spell," the first said.

"He enjoys watching their agony!" the third exclaimed, "What a terrible person!" He didn't notice the tree limb right beside him until he snapped it.

When a person is trying to be quiet, the smallest of sounds can seem like thunder. All three of the Gotsumon winced when the branch snapped, knowing their cover was blown. They thought they might have a chance to run for it until a whip lashed out and smashed into one, knocking him into the other. The third was already running, not even seeing his two friends get knocked down.

"You two are next," the Digimon Emperor grinned wickedly, looking down at them.

Not even five minutes later, the two Gotsumon had Dark Rings around their necks and were facing each other in the make shift ring. They met in the center, bashing their heads together repeatedly, not even seeming to feel it.

The third Gotsumon, noticing his friends hadn't followed him, had circled back in time to see this horrible display, his tears falling freely, "How can they fight? They're best friends!"

The emperor just watched with his usual smirk, enjoying the show.

"Master, is this really the kind of thing that makes you happy?" Wormmon asked, the little green digimon standing nearby, his voice quavering sadly.

+-9

When the Digidestined arrived in the Digiworld again, Upamon and Poromon had become their Rookie stages again.

"Hey, you changed back," Cody mentioned.

"Sure did," Armadillomon drawled with a grin, "We changed back when we returned to the Digital world." Hawkmon nodded, holding up a victory sign.

"Hmm, I wonder if Lucy is nearby," Kari said, looking around the forest for a hint of their teenaged friend.

"I might be close," the pink haired girl in question said with a grin, dropping down out of the tree line, Skymomon on her shoulder.

"Lucy," TK greeted, "What did Gennai have to say about all of this? Does he know of a way to get rid of the Digimon Emperor?"

"Eh, not really," Lucy said, looking over her shoulder at Skymomon, "He's trusting us to take care of it. He wished us good luck though."

Before they could continue with that line of thinking, the Digivices started going off. Looking at her screen, Kari saw three blue blips, showing herself, Yolei and Cody, who had new Digivices, the two red blips that registered Lucy and TK's older models, and a yellow dot off in the distance.

"It looks like there's a Digi-egg nearby," the girl announced.

"Really?" Gatomon asked, "Where?"

"The Digivice says it's not far from here," Cody piped up, turning to the others.

"I wonder who it belongs to," Yolei said.

"I bet I know," Lucy said, getting them to look at her, and she pointedly looked at TK.

The boy blinked, "Me? Why do you think that?"

"Well, so far, it's been you younger kids that have gotten the Digi-eggs," the pink haired teen explained, "Tai, Sora, Izzy, none of them have been able to lift the eggs at all, but you three have. This next one might be TK's, rounding the group off. At least, it makes sense to me."

"But," TK began, "My Digivice is still the older model. Are you sure it'll be me?"

"Well," the pink haired girl sighed, crossing her arms, "I guess there's a chance that it might pull in another kid to pick it up..."

"Well, we'll never know until we find it," Kari said, "So, let's get going."

+-9

Back with the emperor, he was enjoying the struggle going on in his hastily erected arena when his Dark Digivice sounded off. He glared at the screen as it showed the Digidestined nearby. He growled to himself and clenched his fist before him.

"It's those kids again," he clenched his teeth and whirled around, moving with a purposeful stride, "I've had enough of their interference."

+-9

"You know, this reminds me of the old days," Lucy said from the back of the group as they trekked through the forest. She had her hands behind her head and her green eyes were turned skyward, a whimsical smile on her face.

"Yeah," TK said, "It kinda does, doesn't it?"

"Back then we were just a rag tag group of kids from camp, hardly even knew anything about the Digiworld," the pink haired teen went on, "It was kind of fun, just wandering around, no particular direction to follow."

"Yeah, it was also pretty scary, any time a bad digimon would show up out of the blue," the blonde said.

"I think we're getting close," Kari said suddenly, interrupting their reminiscence, eyes on her Digivice, "It's just ahead of us."

The kids began to pick up the pace, eager to find the new Digiegg.

They didn't even get four steps before the voice of the Digimon Emperor boomed over them.

"What are you doing here?!" he demanded, appearing out of thin air.

"Look out!" Yolei yelped, cringing away from the villain.

"_Whirlwind Fist!_" Skymomon shouted, sending off an attack out of reflex, but it passed through the emperor without even ruffling his clothing, "What the-?"

"Ease off, Sky," Lucy said, glaring at the evil human, "It's just a hologram."

"Who do you think you are, sneaking into the digital world?!" the emperor almost growled at them, "What do you think this is? A movie theater, or something?"

"What's he talking about?" Cody asked, turning to TK.

"Ordinary children aren't allowed in the Digital World," the emperor continued, "Only the Digidestined are."

"We _are_ the Digidestined," Kari said, a frown on her face.

"Yeah, we even got these neat little membership packages when we were inducted. Digimon partner, Digivice, a truck load of butt whoopin' to unleash on bad guys, like you," Lucy quipped, holding up a fist, aimed directly at the Digimon Emperor's head.

"You, the Digidestined?" he snorted, "That's physically impossible."

"What do you mean by that?" Yolei asked.

"I mean," he sneered, "Only a perfect human being can be a Digidestined. And, of course, I am the only perfect human being."

"A perfect jerk, maybe," Lucy said, crossing her arms.

The emperor didn't bother to respond, the hologram just fading out as the ground shook violently.

Four years ago, that would have been enough to cause Lucy to go almost catatonic in fear. For the longest time she was deathly afraid of earthquakes, something she'd forced herself to overcome while she had been training to be a Guardian. Now, all it caused was a noticeable tensing of her muscles, and a bit of tightness around her eyes.

In seconds, the origin of the shaking became clear. It was a giant, red, dinosaur digimon with blue stripes. Green spines went down it's back and it had a Dark Ring around its neck. Riding on its left shoulder was the Digimon Emperor himself.

"You are intruders in a place where you don't belong," he said condescendingly, "You are hereby ordered to evacuate the premises without further notice!"

"I _live_ here," Lucy glared up at the emperor, "_You're_ the intruder!"

"This world and everything in it belongs to me!" the Digimon Emperor growled angrily, "Now, get out!" he whipped his arm to the side dramatically.

"Bite me!" the pink haired teen yelled back, getting quite annoyed at this attempted eviction.

The human conqueror chuckled evilly, "If you insist. Get 'em, Tyrannomon!" he grinned the group gathered before him, "He's one of the most powerful digimon. His Blaze Blast will easily take care of you."

"_Blaze Blast!_" Tyrannomon gathered a great amount of flame in his mouth, tilting his head back before he unleashed it at the Digidestined and their partners.

The kids were easily able to escape the attack, but the heat was fierce, even so.

Once the attack finished, Kari whipped around to face the emperor, her goggles glinting, "We'll stop you here!"

"I'm ready, Kari!" Gatomon said.

The girl nodded to her partner, then held up her Digivice, "Digi-armor Energize!" A stream of energy filtered from her D-terminal to her Digivice, then spilled a torrent of flames onto Gatomon, obscuring her from view while showing the phantom images of Agumon's evolutionary line.

"Gatomon, Armor Digivolve to Nibimon! The Fire of Courage!" The fire cat digimon took a threatening step forward, breathing out a plume of smoke and embers from her nostrils.

"So," the twin tailed cat digimon said, clenching her paws into fists, "You want to get into a fire fight, huh?"

The emperor jumped down off the shoulder of Tyrannomon, a smirk on his face, "See, this is why I'm a genius and you're not. You keep using the same attacks against me, yet I keep coming up with something new."

"Yeah, and how well has that worked out for you?" Lucy asked, feigning deep thought, "Oh, that's right, it hasn't!"

Instead of getting angry, though, the Digimon Emperor just grinned, "I was merely studying my enemy. The digimon you freed weren't even all that valuable. Now, let the fight begin!"

The red dinosaur digimon rushed forward with a roar, but Nibimon leapt forward to meet him. Tyrannomon, though, had the advantages of size and physical strength, easily knocking the digimon away from himself.

The fire cat flipped through the air, landing on a tree, feet first. She used that tree as a stage to leap high into the air.

"_Twin Tail Inferno!_" She launched the fireball's at the dinosaur at the same time, merging them into one big one. Tyrannomon just twisted around, slapping it out of the air with a flick of his tail.

"What?" Kari gasped, "No way!"

"Now, Yolei?" Hawkmon asked, looking back at his partner.

The girl nodded, holding up her own Digivice, "Digi-armor Energize!"

"Hawkmon, Armor Digivolve to Halsemon! The Wings of Love!" Yolei hopped on her digimon's back and rode into battle with him.

Seeing another target incoming, Tyrannomon switched targets, "_Blaze Blast!_"

Halsemon easily dodged the attack, returning fire with, "_Tempest Wing!_" Two dark red beams of energy shot from the digimon's eyes, exploding on contact with the dinosaur, knocking him on his back.

The Digimon emperor was gripping his whip in his hands, "You think you can beat me with a little addition?" He snapped the length of leather before him, "How do you like multiplication?"

Again, the ground shook with the approach of more digimon, their roars filling the air as _four_ more Tyrannomon joined the fight.

"Uh," TK began, "This might be a problem." Even as he spoke, the group found themselves surrounded by fire breathing digimon with bad attitudes.

"There are five of them now!" Yolei wailed, getting worried.

"You ready, Armadillomon?" Cody asked, turning to his partner.

"Ready when you are," the golden yellow digimon affirmed.

"Digi-armor Energize!"

"Armadillomon, Armor Digivolve to Digmon! The Drill of Knowledge!"

Skymomon watched as yet another digimon joined the fight, while she had to watch from the sidelines.

"If I could just Digivolve..." the monkey trailed off, biting her bottom lip.

"Come on, let us Digivolve!" Patamon yelled, "What are you afraid of?"

"Ha!" the blue haired preteen laughed, "Like I'd fall for such infantile taunts! As long as I have this Dark Digivice, you'll never be able to Digivolve!" he smirked down at Skymomon and Patamon, "That makes you useless. I might as well destroy you first!"

"Don't even think it!" Lucy yelled up at the Digimon Emperor.

"Too late!" he sneered, even as one of his Tyrannomon breathed fire at the two Rookies. They dodged, but another one tried his luck from their right. They ducked under the flame, just in time to be swiped to the side by a swing from one of the dinosaurs' claws.

They flew through the air swiftly, about to hit a tree when Lucy jumped in the way of their landing point. She caught the two digimon with no small amount of effort, the air being knocked from her lungs.

"Are you two alright?" she wheezed.

"I've been better," Skymomon said.

"I think I need a nap," Patamon groaned.

"Move!" TK yelled. Lucy took his advice, dodging to the side, just before she and the digimon would have been crushed by a big red foot, but ended up having to immediately dodge a blast of fire from two more of the dinos.

Luckily, Digmon chose that moment to pop up, his arrival heralded by a blast of dirt that stopped the fire.

"This isn't working," Kari said, clenching her fists, "We need to do something or..." she trailed off, not needing to finish.

"Just remember that old saying," the emperor gloated, "It's not how you play the game, it's whether you win or lose!"

"We don't stand a chance like this," the youngest of the group said, "We need to go find the other Digi-egg!"

"But, Cody, we don't know who it belongs to," Yolei countered.

"At this point, it doesn't matter. Finding it just might turn the tide to our favor," Kari said.

"It's this way," Cody announced, leading away from the battle.

"Patamon, come this way!" TK called, getting the tan digimon to fly towards him, Lucy and Skymomon right behind him.

"We'll keep them busy!" Nibimon shouted to the children, "Just hurry up and find that egg! _Twin Tail Inferno!_"

"_Tempest Wing!_"

"_Gold Rush!_"

The fiery attack knocked one of the Tyrannomon on its back, while Halsemon used his eye beams to freeze another in place. That kept the two of them immobilized long enough for the Gold Rush attack to open up a fissure and drop them into it.

At the same time, the dinosaur that the Digimon Emperor was riding chased after the kids.

"You can run, but you can't hide!" he proclaimed, another one of the red dinos moving forward at a good clip as well..

"Forgetting something?" Nibimon growled, stopping the emperor's advance on the children. The fifth Tyrannomon kept after the kids, but hopefully he'd be a lot easier to get away from on his own. "You'll have to go through me to get to them!" the fire cat's eyes glowed more ferociously for a moment before she leapt at the Digimon Emperor with a lion's roar.

+-9

"_Boom Bubble!_" Patamon yelled out, shooting a blast of condensed air at the dinosaur chasing them, but all it served to do was force the dinosaur's head to bow momentarily.

"I think you just made him angry," Skymomon called out, even as they joined the others.

"Look," Cody pointed out as they began to break away from the foliage, "Let's hide in that cave!"

As it would turn out, Patamon's seemingly useless attack gave them just enough time to get into the cave without being seen. They moved into the cave about forty feet before they found a stone slab. TK collapsed against it, breathing deeply, thanking god for the cool air in the cave.

"Oh, boy," Lucy said, breathing a little harder herself, "This definitely reminds me of the old days. We were always getting chased back then, too."

"Hey," TK said, looking around the chamber they found themselves in, "Where are Yolei and Kari?"

"Uh," Cody looked to Lucy who paled, looking back towards the entrance of the cave.

TK's eyes widened, realizing what that meant. He made to go for the entrance to the cave. Lucy slid in front of him, stopping him.

"I know what you're thinking, but if you go rushing out there, you'll be worse than useless, TK," the pink haired teen told him.

The blonde just frowned, "I don't care! I wont leave my friends out there all alone! I'm going to save them!" He was so worked up at that moment that he might have tried to push past her. If she tried to stop him, he might have yelled at her again, telling her to get out of his way. Lucy might have yelled back starting an argument.

But that didn't happen.

Instead, a keening came from deeper in the cave, followed by a soft blue light.

"What's that?" Cody asked looking towards the light.

There, shining through the darkness, was a pure white Digi-egg, with a blue bandanna around the top and it was sitting in an icy nest on a pedestal.

"Is that what I think it is?" TK asked, looking at the symbol on the front.

"If you think it's the Crest of Friendship and that your Digivice is reacting to it, then yes," Lucy told him, staring in that direction herself, "TK, you have to try to pick it up."

"I...I... Alright," the boy walked forward until he was right before the small alter, then wrapped his hands around the egg. The moment he touched it, the light from his Digivice grew brighter and brighter until he could feel it changing in his pocket. When he moved to lift the egg, instead of resistance, it just popped right up, creating a pillar of blue light that seemed cold in some odd way.

Holding the egg in one hand, the boy reached into his pocket, pulling out his much changed Digivice. It had become exactly like Kari, Yolei and Cody's except the paneling on his was a yellow that reminded him of his long gone Crest of Hope. He almost jumped three feet in the air when Lucy laid her hand on his shoulder.

"You know what to say," she said simply, grinning at him. He nodded to her, holding up the Digi-egg and his new Digivice at the same time.

"Digi-armor Energize!"

The egg dissolved into a swirl of ice and snow that descended on Patamon with its power. As it swirled around him, freezing into a shape that was slightly larger than Nibimon and clearly having wings, the kids could see images of Gabumon, Garurumon, Weregarurumon and Metalgarurumon in some of the facets.

"Patamon, Armor Digivolve to Zunimon!" The ice shattered, revealing what Patamon had become. For the most part, the digimon was white and covered in feathers. It had two humongous wings that constantly gave off a cold mist and a blue Highwayman's bandanna over his head, the eye holes showing two ice blue eyes. The upper body was humanoid and very well defined, muscularly. Over his left shoulder was a brown leather shoulder guard, a large spike of ice coming off of it. On each of his three fingered hands there was a gauntlet made of more brown leather, each one holding three barrels made of more ice. In place of his mouth was a beak that curved downward sharply. "The Storm of Friendship!"

"Whoa..." TK breathed, Cody agreeing with a nod.

"I am Zunimon," the digimon announced itself, "I am a winter owl digimon. My Dive Bomb Blizzard attack will freeze my enemies in place and I can use my Downy Healing to relieve my allies of their weariness."

Lucy standing off to the side, with Skymomon on her shoulder, grinned wickedly, "I think we just found our ace in the hole."

+-9

In the mess that had been them trying to escape, Yolei and Kari had purposefully split off from the others in an attempt to draw fire from them long enough to let TK, Cody and Lucy find the Digi-egg. It was an unfortunately short run before they found themselves cornered by a Tyrannomon and having to pick another direction. Then it happened again, and again.

They were being herded.

Halfway through their flight through the forest, the digimon appeared again.

"Kari, Yolei, where are the others?" Nibimon asked, easily keeping pace with her partner.

"We split up," Kari said simply, trying no to gasp for breath.

"They went for the Digi-egg," Yolei finished for her, running just behind Kari.

"What should we do now?" Digmon asked, having a little more difficulty with the straight running they were doing. He wasn't built for speed.

"Keep 'em distracted," the brown haired girl said, swallowing a gulp of air, "Hopefully long enough for back up." Unfortunately, as she spoke that, the small group broke out onto a cliff. There was no way for the two human girls to get down from there on their own.

"Halsemon," Yolei began, turning to her red feathered digimon, "Can you get us out of here?"

"I'd say there are two chances of that," the digimon and the girls whipped around to see the Digimon Emperor and all five of the Tyrannomon standing before them, "No way and no how." His grin was as wide as a sharks and twice as nasty.

"We have to fight them off!" Nibimon exclaimed, standing ready and clenching her fists. Digmon and Halsemon were with her, but they were beginning to look a little worse for wear already. The emperor hadn't understated the toughness of the Tyrannomon.

"Let's go!" Halsemon roared, leaping forward, "_Tempest Wing!_"

"_Gold Rush!_"

"_Warrior's Fire!_"

The Tyrannomon moved as a unit. The one the Digimon Emperor was riding fell back while the other four stepped up to bat.

"_Blaze Blast!_" one shouted, breathing a gout of flame at Nibimon.

The cat met the blast head on, her black claymore blocking the attack easily, "Fire doesn't work on me, _genius!_" she sneered.

"No, but I bet being stomped on does," the emperor smirked, even as a second Tyrannomon moved forward and tried to do just that. Nibimon was forced to choose dodging and letting the first roast her partner or get stomped on. For the cat digimon, the choice was easy, but painful.

With Digmon, the battle wasn't going much better. His Gold Rush had momentarily staggered one of the dinosaurs, but when he moved in to try to destroy the Dark Ring the red digimon had scooped him up in both arms and body slammed him underneath all of the dino's bulk.

"Oy, why are the stars out so soon?" the yellow insect asked blearily.

"_Tempest Wing!_" Halsemon was actually having the easiest time. His attacked were hitting and he was dodging the one's that came at him. It would have continued working if it weren't for the other three finishing their battles and joining up against him. Halsemon shot off another red attack, attempted to dodge a Blaze Blast and got a massive tail swiping him out of the air for his effort.

The defeat proved too much for the three digimon and they quickly reverted to their original forms.

"You girls should just give up. It would end a lot quicker that way," the emperor advised them with a superior smirk.

"We'll never give in to the likes of you!" Kari shouted, not discouraged by the defeat of her digimon. She knew her friends were coming.

The blue haired preteen snorted, "Look behind you. You have nowhere left to go. In chess they call this check mate. Give up now and I'll make it quick!"

"_Dive Bomb Blizzard!_" A white figure dropped out of the sky, firing white-blue blasts of freezing energy at the Tyrannomon.

"What is that?!" the Digimon Emperor yelled, barely dodging an icy blast himself, "Grah!" he jumped down to the ground and quickly disappeared into the trees.

The Tyrannomon weren't so lucky. They took the full brunt of the cold attack, their entire bodies up to the neck getting covered with no less than a foot of ice. The white figure then whipped around in a circle, shooting out a storm of icy spikes.

"_Freezing Wind!_" The spikes flew straight and true, smashing into the Dark Rings and not the digimon themselves, destroying the evil devices controlling them.

"Wow!" Yolei exclaimed, "He destroyed the Dark Rings! There isn't even dust left!"

"But who is he?" Kari asked.

"That's Zunimon!" TK said, coming out of the trees with Lucy and Cody just behind him.

"TK!" the brown haired girl exclaimed.

"And Lucy and Cody, too!" Yolei added.

"Then, is that...?" Kari turned to looked at the bandanna wearing digimon, just in time to see him glow yellow and a bit of blue light streak into TK's Digivice. His _new_ Digivice.

"Wow," Patamon said after he finished going back to his Rookie stage, "That Armor Digivolving is one heck of a rush!"

"Don't I know it," Gatomon said to her friend with a grin.

"So which egg did you get, TK?" Kari asked.

"I got the Digi-egg of Friendship," he looked at his new Digivice again, admiring the fact that he could fight along side his friends again to protect this world.

Just a little ways away, the five Tyrannomon began to wake up, the ice around them shattering.

"Hey, what's going on?" one growled, "I've got cold feet."

"That's strange," said another, "You're not the one getting married, I am. Why would you have cold feet?"

"Hey!" Lucy called up to them, "Are you guys okay?"

As one, the five dinosaur digimon looked down at the human, blinking in confusion.

"I guess so," said the one that was apparently getting married soon, "I feel like I could use a hot chocolate though."

"Me too."

"I've got a giant pot at my place we could make some in."

"Count me in."

"Can I have marshmallows in mine?"

The group of dinosaurs moved off, stomping along and conversing about hot chocolate and how they wanted their specific cups.

"I think I'll take a photo of the Tyrannomon for my computer scrapbook," Kari said, pulling up the camera she kept around her neck and taking a quick picture of them before they disappeared from view.

Lucy then noticed the setting sun, and turned to the others, "It's getting a little late, you guys. I think you guys should head home for the night. See you tomorrow?"

"Absolutely," Kari said, getting agreements from the others.

"Come on, I'll walk you guys back to the gate," Lucy said with a smile.

+-9

"These photo's of Tyrannomon turned out great!" Kari said happily, sitting in front of a computer, "Check it out, TK!"

The blonde looked over her shoulder and smiled, "Yeah, those are really good. But they all have red eye."

"Silly, Tyrannomon's eyes are always red!" the girl giggled at her friend.

"Oh, I guess you're right," the boy laughed as well.

Unfortunately the good mood didn't last long. Kari frowned, looking at the picture of the dinosaur digimon, remembering what the Digimon Emperor had forced them to do not even an hour ago. If it weren't for the timely intervention from Zunimon, who knows what would have happened to Kari, Yolei and their digimon. TK hummed to himself, thinking pretty much the same thing.

"I think we may have to change tactics," the blonde finally said.

"What do you mean?" Yolei asked standing over by the digimon, watching all but Gatomon dig ravenously through the treats she'd brought.

"Well, whoever this Digimon emperor is, he's human, right?" TK said.

"Yeah, I guess so, but what about it?" the purple haired girl asked.

"Well, that's just it," Kari said, "He's human. We know how to fight bad digimon. We've done it a lot of times before, but what do we do with a human?"

"We... I don't know," Yolei started off strong but then trailed off, not quite sure.

"I think, maybe, because he's human we'll be able to defeat him," Cody piped in.

"Hmm?" TK looked at the youngest member of the group.

"Well, think about it. You, Kari, Yolei and I all have digimon now that can Armor Digivolve. We've defeated the Digimon Emperor in every battle, but he's still winning the war. When it comes down to it, we may have to defeat him here, in the human world," the eight year old explained.

"I don't know, Cody," Yolei began.

"No," TK interrupted, "He might be right. In the Digiworld, that guy has tons of digimon at his beck and call. We're doing a good job of freeing them, but we haven't completely stopped him yet. The key to doing that just might be in our world."

"I have to agree," Kari said nodding.

"But how will we do that, when we don't even know who he is?" the purple haired girl asked.

"That's... a good question," TK said, sighing, "I guess, until we find out, we'll just have to keep it up in the Digital World."

"Right!" the rest of them all agreed at once.

+-9

In the Ichijouji apartment, Ken Ichijouji smirked at his computer screen, showing an image of the dark glasses he wore as his other persona, the Digimon Emperor. His smirk wouldn't leave his face, even though he had lost the battle today.

"Tomorrow is another day," he said to himself, thinking about all the schemes he had in the works. It was only a matter of time before he got the best of those annoying brats. He was the only _true_ Digidestined. They were just posers who'd stumbled into his game.

"Before long, I'll figure out how to stop Armor Digivolution, too, then they won't even be bugs on my windshield," he chuckling darkly, imagining the looks of utter despair on their faces.

Chapter Three: End.

Please Enjoy.


	4. Chapter 4 The Spires

Sorry for the delay. I have no reasonable excuse this time. Just Writer's Block.

The Next few chapters will be very close to what was seen in season two. The next major change is in Episode/Chapter Seven. Please endure the wait.

On the note of relationships in this story and how they develop, Tai and Lucy will rather quickly come together, especially compared to the others. TK and Kari, as much as i support it, will only be lightly explored, the reason being that they are only twelve. Ken and Yolei will basically be the same. The other established relationships will follow the scale from the show.

Chapter Four: The Spires

"_Pepper Breath!_" Agumon announced, spitting out an orange fireball that shredded the bars to a cage in the Digimon Emperor's make shift arena.

"_Lightning Paw!_" Gatomon shouted next swiping her claws through the bars of another cage like a hot knife through butter.

"Come on, everyone," TK said, gesturing for the digimon to come on out of their cages, "Let's get going."

A swarm of Gotsumon and Elecmon piled out of the cage, running for the exit, Kari took the lead with TK, Lucy and Tai brought up the rear, and Yolei and Cody had the flanks.

"Don't stop running till your feet feel like lead," Lucy advised, keeping pace with the older boy next to her, "We don't know when that jerk might come back, so don't slow down."

"What if our feet are _made _of lead?" One of the Gotsumon asked as they thumped along.

"Then run until they feel like marshmallows," the girl retorted.

It would end up taking them somewhere close to fifteen minutes to get out of the immediate vicinity of the arena, and hopefully far enough away from the emperor's operations that he wouldn't bother trying to recapture them.

The Gotsumon and Elecmon collapsed onto their stomachs, gasping for breath.

"You guys are officially fugitives!" Agumon chirped, a grin on his reptilian face.

The digimon just kept gasping for breath. Some of them might have even fallen asleep. Most of the kids were breathing a little heavy, too, aside from Lucy and Tai, the two most physically active members of the group.

Kari wiped the sweat from her brow as her breathing steadied, "I hope all the Digimon Emperor's strongholds will be this easy to raid."

"I second that," Yolei said with a smile, "The less trouble we have, the better."

"Yeah, but don't you think it was _too_ easy?" TK asked.

"What do you mean, TK?" Patamon asked, resting on his human friend's head.

"Well, don't you think it was a little odd that there wasn't even a single guard in the entire place. It's like he wanted us to break in. I think he's up to something," the blonde explained.

"Aw, man," Skymomon said, "Now that you pointed that out it makes way too much sense to ignore," the little blue monkey groaned.

"Yeah, I have to agree," Kari said next, "This guy wouldn't let us get away this easy without some kind of reason."

Tai rubbed his chin in thought, humming for a moment, then said, "We'll worry about that later, right now we should go back to the Human World," he grinned, "I'm starving, I can already smell the cafeteria food." He started in the direction of the gate between worlds.

"Count me in," Lucy said, "Sora invited me and Sky over for the night." She was walking along near the middle of the group with her hands behind her head.

Towards the back, Gatomon stopped and looked at the giant black tower that the Emperor had placed here, and many other places throughout the Digital World.

_I wonder what that tower is for..._

+-9

In his lair, lounging in his chair with one leg crossed over the other, the Digimon Emperor was studying a map full of black, white and grey squares. The white squares were dominant, but it was a close call with the black one. There seemed to be no discernible pattern to the placement of the black and grey squares, more like someone had just tossed them all over the place for the fun of it.

"The next one should be in place right about _now_," the emperor said, just as another black square replaced a white one, getting a grin to split his face, "Now to let everyone know who's the boss." He stood up and whirled around dramatically, stalking out of the room with Wormmon on his heals.

+-9

It didn't take long for his minions to deliver the Digimon Emperor to a town at the base of some rocky hills with one of the black towers, freshly erected, setting the tone for his arrival.

It wasn't long before he gathered all the digimon before him, a team of Veggiemon, yellow plant digimon with red eyes and long vines for arms, behind him, all of them wearing Dark Rings.

"This Control Spire is the most dominating object in the Digiworld," he announced, "Wherever I build one, the area around it will be under my control and all those near it will be my slaves!" at the front of the group of Gazimon he was addressing was a very familiar digimon wearing a light blue fur with darker blue stripes, Gabumon, "It's useless to try to escape and those who do will have to answer to my soldiers!" the human grinned as the Veggiemon moved forward at his command.

Gabumon just side, is head bowed, _How do I get myself into these things?_

+-9

"Aiiee!" Yolei's scream almost deafened the Digidestined, such was her surprise at seeing the Gotsumon they had only so recently rescued having come through the gate with them.

"Are you crazy?!" Izzy all but yelled, nearly glaring at the group, "Bringing the Gotsumon back from the Digital World?!"

"We didn't have a choice," Tai said, unrepentant, "We couldn't just leave them there for the Digimon Emperor to make into slaves, right?"

"Yeah," Lucy nodded her agreement.

"But how are we going to explain it if Mister Fujiyama comes in here?" Yolei asked.

"Don't worry," Cody piped up, "I'll tell him I'm taking a sculpting class, and these are some of my early masterpieces," the boy turned to the three beside him, "Hit it, boys." All at once, everyone of the rock digimon took a dynamic pose. The three nearest him covered their ears, eyes and mouth respectively.

"Hmm," Lucy intoned, looking closely at one of them in the widely known 'Thinker' pose, "Very... Modern Art."

"Eh, yeah, that's _one_ way to put it," the look on the purple haired girl's face quite dubious.

Izzy stepped over to said girl, putting the problem of the digimon on the back burner for now, "Yolei, I have a big favor to ask. May I borrow your Digivice?"

"Uh, sure," she said, pulling the device from her pocket, "But what for?"

"Well, it's obvious the power from your Digivice opens the gate to the Digital World, but our old Digivices don't seem to work," the tech genius explained.

"Izzy's right," Tai nodded, holding up his silvered device, "I've tried using mine, but it just wont work. The only way _we_ can get into the Digital World," he gestured to himself, Lucy and Izzy, "is if one of _ you_ open the gate for us."

"Exactly, which is part of the reason I wanted to try an experiment with the new Digivices, if that's okay with you," the red head told Yolei.

"Mmhm," she nodded, giving up her Digivice.

Izzy took it, giving it a cursory glance before placing it in his own pocket.

+-9

A whip cracked against the ground in front one of the yellow plant Digimon, Veggiemon.

"Let's move out," the emperor said with a cruel grin, "I've got an early tea time, in the morning." Behind him stood a hastily erected prison, for those few digimon that would dare to resist his absolute authority.

His orders given, the young man sat on a mobile throne, that was quickly lifted by a dozen of the Veggiemon, all wearing his Dark Rings.

In one of the many cells, watching as the human conqueror left for other ventures, or tea if he was to be believed, Gabumon and a pack of Gazimon plotted their escape.

"We break out tonight, boys," the fur wearing digimon informed his compatriots, then he turned to them, "Aw, why wait? Everyone, stay to the back of the cell," Gabumon faced the door of their cage and gathered the cold fire in his throat, "_Blue Blaster!_"

The single attack was enough to knock the steel door off its hinges and knock out one of the Veggiemon guarding the prison. The captive digimon didn't hesitate for a second, instantly dashing out of their confinement. The escape was going surprisingly well, that one guard seemed to be the only resistance and it had been little to no trouble to circumvent him.

Then a spiked, green bulb attached to a tomato red stem came out of left field, literally, and smashed Gabumon back into the Gazimon, knocking them down like a bunch of bowling pins.

"Apparently you do listen to instructions!" a new voice growled, casting a shadow over the escaping digimon.

"Who are you?" Gabumon demanded.

"I am the Digiworld's biggest salad bar, Redveggiemon! I am the biggest and the ripest of all Veggiemon. My Stink Jet attack destroys my enemies with noxious fumes!" his name was very telling. He was a deep red, like he constantly had rage boiling beneath his surface. From the top of his head he had a green leaves looking like drooping green hair. He held himself above the ground with his long, red arms that ended in green, spiked clubs. Around his middle, he wore a Dark Ring.

"Try to stop us, stinky!" the fur wearing digimon challenged the plant creature.

"For trying to escape you get to smell my roots," the champion lowered himself to the ground then lashed out with one of his clubs, "and I have root rot!"

The Gazimon winced, watching the fur wearing digimon get pummeled, but powerless to help.

"Smell this!"

"Ugh!" Gabumon groaned.

"Smell it again!"

"That's disgusting!" the pour dog-like digimon groaned, being beaten and drowned in stench at the same time, "No more, please!"

"You kidding, I'm just warming up!" the controlled digimon grinned evilly, "Hey, if you can't stand the smell, then get out of the kitchen!" the plant digimon, lashed his clubbed limb forward, bashing Gabumon so hard he was sent flying off the side of the cliff with a pained yell.

Luckily for the fur wearing Digimon, he had a relatively soft landing in a fast moving river that quickly swept him downstream, despite his struggling.

"Gah!" he coughed, "My fur is dry clean only!"

Back at the top of the cliff, Redveggiemon turned to the rest of the escapees, "Let that be a lesson be a lesson to all of you! Don't try to defy the power of the Digimon Emperor!"

+-9

Some time later, o the rocky bank of the river he had fallen into, Gabumon was barely able to pull himself ashore, pain and exhaustion making it difficult even to crawl. Before him stood one of the many TVs that had been sprinkled throughout the Digital World to act as gates.

Gabumon saw the gate and forced himself forward, "I have to warn the others," he spoke, "They need to be warned," he grunted from the effort, dragging himself another few feet before collapsing, "I have to find Matt. Ugh..." he almost coughed from the scent that filled his nose, "Man, I stink."

The poor digimon lost consciousness before he had the chance to see that the gate activated, sensing on of the Digidestined digimon, and sending a distress signal out out his partner.

+-9

In the human world, the Digidestined in question was putting on a concert with his band. Matt's group actually had quite the following in Odaiba, the concert hall was actually all but completely full of teens enjoying his music. TK was actually back stage, grinning proudly at the show. He always knew his brother was awesome.

Out in the crowd, towards the back, were Sora, Lucy and Skymomon, the digimon pretending to be just a cute back pack.

"Wow," Lucy said, "I knew that Matt had some skill, but this is great," she was bobbing her head in time with the rhythm, her pink locks swaying back and forth.

"Yeah," the sixteen year old next to her agreed, watching the blonde teen pluck the strings with a somewhat dreamy expression.

Lucy saw that and smirked, nudging her, "Hey, if you want to meet him, I could get you back stage," she joked.

Sora just laughed and nudged the younger girl back, "Hush you."

+-9

After the concert, and back in his school uniform, Matt was standing in the hall, looking out a window.

"Listen, TK, just because I have a rock band doesn't mean I can hide a band of rocks that just happen to be digimon," he turned to look at his younger brother.

"Well," TK reasoned, "Think about it, maybe they could be your backup singers."

"They sound to gravelly," the older blonde returned.

"Sup, rock star?" Lucy greeted as she walked up to the pair, Sora right beside her, "You've come a long way from playing the harmonica."

"I'll say, you played great today, Matt," Sora said next.

"Yeah, we've been practicing for months," Matt smiled briefly

Lucy had moved next to TK a teasing smile on her face as she watched her surrogate sister and TK's brother flirt with each other, "Think they've even got a clue?"

"You kidding?" the boy in the white bucket had said back, "I bet Sora's struggling with whether or not she's got a shot at my rock star brother, and Matt's just taking her flirting as wishful thinking on his part. They've been dancing around each other for the last two years."

The pink haired girl snickered.

The jovial mood came to an abrupt end, though, when TK's D-terminal rang. At the same time, Matt's Digivice began chirping a warning to him.

"There's a problem in the Digiworld," the older blonde announced.

"I just got an email from Yolei," TK added, stepping forward, "It says, 'Emergency! Hurry back to school!' Emergency?" He looked to his older brother.

"I just hope Gabumon's okay," the older blonde said.

Lucy and Sora glanced to one another and nodded, "Count us in."

"Right, Let's go!" Matt took the lead.

+-9

In the classroom, Yolei typed frantically at the computer, bringing up the gate to the Digital World, specifically targeting the gate that had sent out the distress signal. Matt stood a short distance away, taping his fingers against his arm impatiently. If he were younger, more impulsive, he might be grumbling about how long this was taking, but he wasn't, so he didn't. He knew from working with Izzy that rushing the techie on the team only caused them to make mistakes.

"Alright, the gate is open. Shall we go?" The girl's answer was Kari holding up her Digivice to the screen, initiating the transport.

In seconds, the group and their digimon partners found themselves in the Digiworld.

"Gabumon!" Matt cried out, seeing his partner unconscious on the ground before them, moving forward quickly to help him up.

"Oh, Matt!" the digimon said softly, waking up and pushing up to his knees.

"Are you okay?" the teen asked.

"Let's just say, I'll never look at steamed vegetables the same way," the digimon quipped.

"Okay, I want you to tell me everything that happened," Matt said.

"Good, we never talk anymore," Gabumon smiled.

"_Hey, everybody_," Yolei said, back in the human world, "_I'm going over to Izzy's to get my Digivice back, then I'll meet up with you there_." The girl waved a quick goodbye then stood up to go do as she said.

As she was leaving, the little pink ball of energy that was Yolei's partner hovered in front of the screen, "_Have no fear while Yolei is gone, this place shall be guarded by Poromon!_" the little digimon rhymed, then shut down the gate.

Standing just in front of her partner, Gatomon had a question that had been on her mind for a while now, "Why do they call those things 'Rabbit Ears'?" she asked, pointed to the two looped antennae on top of the TV, "Why don't they call them 'Cat Ears'? After all, when was the last time you saw a rabbit sleeping on top of a TV?"

Kari tilted her head to the side as she regarded her partner, "This is what you think about?"

"Okay, breaks over, let's get back to work," Patamon said, hovering near TK, Gabumon and Matt.

"What's the plan?" Lucy asked.

"Come with me," Gabumon told them, "I'll show you the way," he began to lead back the way he'd come, going through the forest instead of the river.

It wasn't long before they found themselves on a small plateau over looking the latest area targeted by the Digimon Emperor.

"Is this the place?" Sora asked, crouched down with the rest of them, to avoid being seen.

"Yes, this is the village of San Guria," Gabumon told them, "It was always a quiet place, everyone minded their own business, and then the Digimon Emperor came along," he pointed out the huge black spire that stood on the rocky hill above the village.

"Another one of those black towers," Gatomon announced.

"The emperor calls them Control Spires," the fur wearing digimon informed them.

"Control Spires, huh?" Lucy said, narrowing her eyes at the black monolith, "Guys, I've got a have baked theory about how mister high and mighty is controlling the digimon."

"I bet I know where you're going with this," Sora said, "It's right in the name, after all. Somehow, those things keep the Dark Rings empowered."

"Got it in one, sis," Lucy grinned back at the older girl, "First batch of ice cream is on me tonight."

"So, what do we do about it?" Skymomon asked, keeping them on topic, though filing that ice cream comment for later perusal.

"Whatever it is, we can't just run down there guns blazing," Matt said, "The Digimon Emperor could be down there, just waiting for us to fall into an ambush."

"Yeah, and that's not the worst of it," TK added, "If he knows we're coming for him, he might be using some of the digimon he captured as a shield."

"Right," Kari nodded, "We need to figure out a way to get down there and help out without any of the innocent digimon being hurt."

"They're being guarded by the Veggiemon," Patamon said, having come back from a quick reconnaissance flight, "Watch out for the digi-sludge!"

"Patamon, tell us everything you know about Redveggiemon," Matt told the tan digimon.

Patamon nodded, coming down to land on Gabumon's head and explaining all he knew about the aggressive plant digimon. After a few seconds, Matt looked at the rest of the group, "Okay, I've got a plan to sneak into the rest of the prison," he paused for a moment, "Who's the sneakiest among us?"

As one, all the kids and digimon, except for Sora and Matt, looked right at Lucy. The girl just grinned confidently.

"Do you think you can get past any of their guards without being noticed?" the blonde asked.

"You tell me," the girl smiled wickedly, happy to show off a little, then she moved. In the space of the blink of an eye, she was gone, then her voice came from behind Matt, "Can I?"

"Whoa, Lucy!" Sora exclaimed, "How did you do that?"

"However you did it, that's great, we'll need you to move through the town unseen," the sixteen year old boy said, "The rest of us are gonna go get captured by the enemy."

+-9

At the entrance to the village, a large sand stone gate, two Veggiemon stood on guard. From the corner of one red eye, the digimon on the left noticed the approach of a group.

"Stop right there! Identify yourselves!" he barked at them.

At the lead of the group was a Gatomon, who held up her right fore paw, showing a Dark Ring around it, "It's okay, we're one of you. We just caught these human's and their digimon." Behind her, all in ropes, were Gabumon, then Matt, Sora, Kari, TK and Cody. Patamon was flying above them, a Dark Ring around his middle, with Armadillomon taking up the rear, the ring around his left fore leg.

"Where are you taking us?" Kari demanded with a glare.

"Pipe down!" Armadillomon ordered, "You're all goin' to jail, where you belong!" The group was led into the town, piles of pink sludge falling all around them with disgusting splats, though thankfully none of it came close to the group.

The Veggiemon just laughed ominously, missing the brief shadow that moved over the wall while they were watching the prisoners.

It didn't take the group that long to make it out of ear shot of the gate guards. After making sure they weren't being watched by any other slaves of the emperor, the group stopped on a staircase that sloped gently upwards.

"Wow, those guys didn't even notice these rings were plastic," Patamon said, landing before them and tapping the dark ring.

"Don't start feeling to frisky yet," Gatomon warned, "The first set of guards were just flunkies. We haven't even faced the pick of the litter. And even if we get past them, we still have to find a way to destroy the control spire." Even as the cat digimon said it, the group turned as one to look at the black tower that might be the key to freeing the local digimon.

Sora nodded and said, "Luckily we have a woman on the outside."

They started moving again, none of them seeing Lucy or her digimon anywhere, but knowing that she was close by.

+-9

It wasn't long before Gabumon and the rest of the group tied up in the rope were led to the digimon's old cell and tossed in rather brusquely. Matt couldn't help a grunt in pain when he landed on his side, and Sora let out an 'oof' when she hit the ground.

"Just because we're prisoners doesn't mean you have to treat us so roughly," the girl glowered at the yellow plant digimon that had manhandled them.

"Aw, shut up, human, you wont have much to complain about as soon as the emperor gets back," the digimon turned around to face Gatomon, Patamon and Armadillomon, "Thanks for helping to capture them, by the way, the emperor will be pleased. We could have caught them ourselves, you know, but I guess you beat us to the punch," the controlled digimon grinned, but that grin slipped off his face when he heard clattering and saw the group of digimon removing their dark rings, easy as pie, "Ah!"

"Speaking of 'punch'," Gatomon quipped, stepping up, "_Lightning Paw!_" The cat digimon launched the attack quick as a shot, sending one of the Veggiemon right up against the bars and knocking him out. Kari grinned, giving her partner the victory sign.

"_Boom Bubble!_" Patamon hit another his special attack, knocking him against the stone walls, while Armadillomon simply pinned two to the floor, "This way, everyone!" the little digimon said, leading the entire population of the prison out and deeper into the village.

After only a few minutes he turned back, "Wait, there are more guards."

And, just as he'd said, there were four more enslaved Veggiemon at the base of the stairs, laughing about something or other, not having noticed the group yet, so they ducked behind the corner before they were seen.

"What now?" Sora asked," They're blocking the exit."

"Back this way," Gabumon suggested, "It comes out on top, closer to the Control Spire."

"Good idea," TK's digimon agreed.

Just as they were exiting the village proper, Lucy showed up, sweating a little, but no worse for wear otherwise, "Good to see you guys made it out. Everything go alright?"

"Yeah. Luckily, guess we didn't need you to sneak around after all, but better safe than sorry," Matt said, stepping forward.

"Trust me, I know that one," Lucy said, pulling up the sleeve of her hoodie to show a scar on her right bicep. It was about the size of a silver dollar and looked like she had been burned.

"Oh, god, Lucy," Sora gasped, "Did you get that fighting digimon?"

"Pah, no," the pink haired girl waved the concern away, "I got that little sucker from not paying attention while visiting Meramon. He even told me I shouldn't sit so close to his personal hot spring."

Sora thought about that and giggled a little, "Yeah, I guess a fire digimon might run his bath a little hotter than we would."

"Come on," Matt interrupted, "Let's get up there and see if there's another way down."

"Right," Lucy rolled her sleeve back down and let the others take the lead.

It took nearly fifteen minutes to reach the top, but only an instant to realize that the only way down was the cliff that Gabumon had been tossed off of.

"Think we could get down from here?" TK asked wonderingly, looking for any viable route.

"Not a chance," Kari shook her head, "It's way to high and steep."

"If only we had a rope or something, we could climb down," Matt suggested.

"I'll go look for one," Gabumon told them.

"Wait," a couple of the Gazimon moved forward, "We don't need a rope. We'll just hold onto each other and you guys can climb down the Bunny-slope. Our way of saying thanks."

"That would be great! Thanks!" Matt's partner told them, "Okay, let's go!"

The Gazimon moved to run back to the others of their kind to tell them the plan, Gabumon right behind them, but the three digimon were knocked off their feet and onto their backs by the digi-sludge that smacked them grossly in the face.

"No one's going anywhere!" the voice caused the whole group to turn and see Redveggiemon standing there threateningly, holding one club limb up aggressively.

"Gatomon, Armor Digi-wah!" Kari began, then cried out as she, Cody and TK were tackled by Veggiemon and wrapped up in their tentacles.

"Let her go!" Gatomon demanded, launching toward one of the Veggiemon to swipe at him, but one of the clubs lased out and smacked her down.

"Ah, ah, ah!" Redveggiemon gloated, "No interfering! Ha!" He bashed her again.

"Gatomon!" Kari cried.

"_Stink Jet!_" the red digimon shouted, opening his maw and letting out a cloud of nauseating fumes that all but knocked the digimon, Lucy, Sora and Matt off their feet. The Veggiemon all leapt into action again, wrapping up all the prisoners except two. Even gagging Lucy was able to dodge the attacking Veggiemon, and Skymomon was just as quick, but even smaller, so that much harder to contain.

"Huh?" Redveggiemon looked at them, "What are you slackers waiting for, get them!" He lashed out with his clubbed arm at Lucy, but she just dodged to the side nimbly.

"Was that aimed at me?" the girl asked with a grin.

"_Whirlwind Fist!_" Skymomon shouted, sending a green tornado at one of the Veggiemon sneaking up on her partner.

"Grr!" the red plant growled, "I'm gonna stick you in a blender and hit puree!" he lashed out with his limbs again, but the pink haired girl jumped over his attack, dodging around him, easily.

"Lucy! Be careful!" Sora cried.

TK, Kari and Cody tried several times to get their digimon to armor Digivolve, but each time they start to even say 'armor', the Veggiemon would squeeze them tighter, keeping them from even speaking.

"Darn it!" Gabumon growled, "If only I could Digivolve!"

"There's gotta be a way," Matt insisted, struggling against the digimon holding him captive.

Lucy wasn't paying attention, however. She had her own problems at the moment. It wasn't all that hard to dodge the attacks, Redveggiemon wasn't the fastest digimon she dealt with, but humans really weren't as tough as digimon, so she couldn't afford to take her eyes off the enslaved digimon for a moment. That's not to say she wasn't paying attention to where she was going.

"Nya, nya!" the girl taunted, rolling out of the way of another attack, "Are you even trying to hit me?" she twirled left, "Come on, it's like you're going in slow motion!" she hopped over a random swipe.

Behind her, Skymomon was keeping the other Veggiemon from being able to get close to her partner, giving any that did an up close look at her Whirlwind Fist.

"Gah!" the red digimon roared angrily, "Will you just sit still and take your whipping!"

"Let me thing about that," Lucy said, rolling to a standing position right in front of the spire, putting a finger to her chin and looking upwards.

Seeing an opening, Redveggiemon put everything he had into one more attack, launching a double club attack at the pink haired teen. She waited until the vines were only a few feet away then poured everything she had into juking out of the way of the deadly attack.

The others screamed, thinking that their friend was about to bite the big one.

The Veggiemon laughed triumphantly, thinking they won.

And then the attack struck...

"What?!"

… the Control Spire.

"Awe, did you miss me?" The pink haired girl taunted.

Electricity arched off the black tower, cracks traveling up the lengths of it.

Suddenly, Matt's Digivice began keening in a familiar way, the same with Lucy's. Sora's would have too, had Biyomon been nearby. Two white bar codes shot into the sky, then rained back down on Gabumon and Skymomon, initiating their Digivolutions.

"Skymomon, Digivolve to SkyYetimon!"

"Gabumon, Digivolve to Garurumon!"

"Huh?" Redveggiemon intoned fearfully, finding himself nose to nose with a horse sized wolf that didn't want to be his friend.

"Whoa!" Lucy said, looking back at the cracked tower. She had expected breaking it to release the digimon under the rings, she had no idea that it would let the older kids help their digimon Digivolve.

"Gabumon," Matt said, stunned, "You Digivolved!"

"Grr!" The wolf growled menacingly at the red plant digimon.

"Hey, uh, no hard feelings... right?" Redveggiemon said, trying to save his hide.

At the same time, SkyYetimon jumped over to land in front of the Veggiemon holding her friends hostage with a heavy thump. She bent down to look the Veggiemon in the eyes and cracked her rather large knuckles.

As one they released their hostages and ran for their lives.

"I won't be beaten like this," Redveggiemon growled, rallying himself and preparing to loose another Stink Jet at Garurumon.

"I think so," the growling voice of the wolf digimon interrupted, "_Howling Blaster!_" The blue blast slammed into the red digimon, sending him sliding along the ground.

"Ow..." he groaned pitifully.

"Hey, everyone!" Yolei suddenly shouted, getting everyone's attention, now that the major threats were taken care of. Running along with the girl were Tai, Izzy, Agumon and all the Gotsumon, while Hawkmon followed in the air.

Tai, Izzy and Agumon stopped in front of the Champion level wolf digimon.

"Garurumon," Kari's brother breathed.

"How did you Digivolve?" Agumon asked, not unreasonably.

The wolf turned towards the others who shrugged, "I'm not sure."

"You know what I think?" Patamon asked, "I bet when Redveggiemon's attack cracked the control spire we were free from it's power."

"They're certainly going to need a lot of glue," Hawkmon joked.

"You're right, Patamon," Lucy told the little guy, "When I tricked that rotten tomato into attacking the spire, I just thought it would short out the Dark Rings. But we can now assume that these things are how the emperor is blocking Digivolution."

"So, what does that mean for us, exactly?" Tai asked.

Sora just grinned, "That means, all we have to do is knock down the spires and that kid wont have nearly as much control as he thinks he's got."

"Exactly," the pink haired girl nodded, then looked back over at the remaining spire, "So, would anyone like to do the honors?"

Armadillomon hopped forward, "Well, if you're lookin' for a volunteer, let me be the one."

"Yeah!" Cody agreed, holding up his Digivice, "Digi-armor Energize!"

"Armadillomon, Armor Digivolve to Digmon! The Drill of Knowledge!" The insectoid digimon stepped forward, the drills on his hands and nose spinning rapidly, "_Rock Crackin'!_" The drills cut into the black monolith easily, spreading a spider web of cracks up along it, causing the entire tower to arch with electricity again before it began to tumble to one side. It hit the ground and became only so much black gravel. "Sorry," Digmon said, looking at the group, "I forgot to yell timber."

"Whoa," Redveggiemon said, rubbing his head with one of his clubbed limbs and holding up his inactive Dark Ring before him, "Did I get married while I was asleep?"

The other Veggiemon removed their rings as well, looks of befuddlement on their faces.

"I guess it does both, blocking Digivolution and controlling the Dark Rings," Lucy said, looking at the freed digimon, "Control Spire indeed."

"It must have acted like an electric rod," Yolei said.

"What do you mean?" Hawkmon asked, winging over to her.

"Well, the Digimon Emperor built this tower as a means of sending power to the Dark Rings, controlling all the digimon within this specific area," the purple haired girl said, then looked back at Izzy, "Isn't that right?"

"Yeah," the tech genius nodded with a smile, "I'm quite impressed with your theory, Yolei."

"I wonder how many more Control Spires there are, scattered around the Digital World," Tai said, looking at the remains of the one they'd destroyed.

"Well, whatever the number is, we know they all have to be destroyed," Matt said next.

"Sounds like the new Digidestined have their hands full," Sora chimed in.

"Leave it to us," TK grinned, "We can handle it!"

"Mm-hm!" Kari nodded, smiling herself.

"This means we can take the Gotsumon back to their home now," Agumon said, looking at Gatomon.

"I'm all over it," the cat agreed.

"Follow me," Tai said, "I'll lead the way!" He started off, the Gotsumon following him, with Kari, Gatomon and Agumon bringing up the rear.

"Wait for me," the girl said as she jogged along.

"Garurumon will stay here and protect you guys from the emperor," Matt said from Garurumon's back. He'd missed being able to ride his partner all through the Digital World. It was a heck of an experience.

"Garurumon!" all the Gazimon cheered for their new guardian.

+-9

"I'm glad the Gotsumon aren't staying with us anymore," Yolei said, once they were all back in the Human world aside from Tai, Matt, Lucy, Kari and Sora, "Every time they touched my CDs they scratched them."

"And they clogged the sink when they brushed their teeth," Cody added.

"It was kind of fun having them around though," TK said.

"Hey everyone, I really think you should have a look at this," Izzy said, sitting in front of the computer. He had been typing away as usual while they'd been cooling down from their latest mission.

"Wow! What is that?" Yolei asked, she, TK, and Cody coming to see what the deal was.

"I discovered it when I was examining your Digivice, Yolei," the Tech Genius told her, "It appears to be a map of the Digital World. Do you see this white square?" he pointed out on on the large grid on the computer screen, surrounded by black squares, "It used to be black until we destroyed the Control Spire. Unfortunately, there are a lot of black squares left, and they all have spires."

"Gee, Izzy, it's going to take a long time to turn all those black squares into white ones," Cody said, sounding a little apprehensive about how long it would take.

"And that's hoping that the jerk doesn't come back and make new ones," Yolei said.

"Well, us older Digidestined actually have a plan for that," Izzy said with a confident smile.

+-9

"They don't make Control Spires like they used to," Greymon laughed. Gatomon had already reverted from Nibimon, using her armored for to critically damage the spire, which allowed Agumon to Digivolve in the first place. Tai and Kari just smiled at one another.

"Ha!" Tai said, giving his digimon a thumbs up, "Way to go, Greymon! You're a one 'mon wrecking crew!"

Some distance away, in another area, SkyYetimon and Birdramon were looking at another spire.

"If we get any closer our digimon might de-Digivolve," Lucy called over to Sora, "Think you can hit it from here?"

"Absolutely," the older girl nodded, then looked up at her partner, "Birdramon?"

"My pleasure," the flaming bird digimon gathered her fire into her wings and focused for a moment, "_Meteor Wing!_"

The target was further than normal, so it took a little while longer to see the effects, but the attack screamed through the air unerringly, exploding against the spire and knocking it over.

"Awesome!" Lucy cheered, "Looks like the second pint of ice cream is on me, too!"

"About that," SkyYetimon said, looking down at her partner.

The pink haired teen laughed, "Yes, I'll bring some Tie Dye ice cream for you."

+-9

In his lair, the Digimon Emperor's Digivice chirped. He pulled out of his pocket, a frown on his face, as he looked at the map on the screen.

"What?" he grunted then pressed a button on the side sending the picture up into a screen in front of him, showing him the full grid map of the black and white squares, "How did three of my Control Spires..." he growled, "It must be those meddling kids!" He shrugged after a couple of moments, "Oh well, it doesn't really matter. Those areas were of little importance in the grand scheme of things and, in another year, I'll have the whole Digital World under my control," he stood up, smirking evilly, "And then finally, every living thing in the Digital World will become my slave, forever. And that includes those kids, too!" He laughed maniacally, envisioning his complete control of this particular world. Who knows, maybe after he was done here, he could move to Earth.

Chapter Four: End

Please Enjoy.


End file.
